Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 04.djvu/461

 the 'Fables of Æsop and Others,' translated by Samuel Croxall, sometime archdeacon of Hereford, of which, between 1722 and 1776, there had been no less than ten editions. But even Croxall's illustrator does not appear to have been the originator of the plates, as some of them are plainly copied from Sebastian le Clerc, while others again have their prototypes in the fine old folio Æsop of Francis Barlow, published as far back as 1665. Bewick, however, probably knew little of Barlow and le Clerc, and only aimed at the modernisation and improvement of Croxall. In this he thoroughly succeeded, substituting more accurate studies of animals and more natural arrangements of detail and background. As before, his own special designs (e.g. the 'Hounds in Couples,' the 'Beggar and his Dog,' the 'Collier and the Fuller') are superior to the rest, and already foreshadow the thoroughly individual talent of the tail-pieces to the 'Quadrupeds' and 'Birds.' In fact, in altering and modernising Wootton and the rest, Bewick had graduated as a designer, and the discipline seems to have been his best academic training. Before parting with the Gay and 'Select Fables,' it should be added that their beauties can only be adequately appreciated in the very rare originals. In Emerson Chamley's so-called 'Select Fables ' issued at Newcastle in 1820, a vamped-up volume which included many of the cuts from Gay and other sources, the original blocks, according to Hugo (Bewick Collector, i. 147), haa been 'much altered, and certainly not improved ' by Bewick's pupil Charlton Nesbit. From these the more modern reprints are naturally derived.

With the publication of the 'Select Fables' it had become manifest that there had arisen and engraver who, to singular technical dexterity, added an unexampled appreciation of the qualities and limitations ot wood as a medium for the reproduction of designs. It was also clear that, besides being an engraver, he was, in his own way, an artist of remarkable capacity as a faithful interpreter of animal life, and a genuine humourist of a sub-Hogarthian type. All that he now required was a field in which he might adequately exhibit either side of his pictorial character. In the illustrations to the 'Quadrupeds' and 'Birds' he found opportunities for both.

The 'Quadrupeds' were begun soon after the publication of the 'Select Fables.' But while working at them Bewick produced the large block known as the 'Chillingham Bull,' 1789, one of the famous wild cattle which Landseer has painted and Scott has sung in the ballad of 'Cadyow Castle.' This, when it appeared, was Bewick's best and most ambitious work, though he excelled it in his subsequent efforts. An accident which made early impressions extremely rare has, however, given it a fictitious value with collectors. After a few copies had been struck off on parchment and paper, the block split, and though, by repairing it and fixing it in a gun-metal frame, it was found possible to take impressions, they have, naturally, never acquired the importance which attaches to those struck off before the accident, one, at least, of which has fetched as much as fifty guineas. The 'General History of Quadrupeds' was begun in 1785, Bewick executing the cuts and vignettes after working hours, and his partner, Mr. Beilby, who was 'of a bookish or reading turn,' undertaking the letterpress. It was published in 1790, and sold rapidly. A second and third edition appeared in 1791 and 1792 respectively, and by 1824 an eighth edition had been reached. Generally speaking, those animals with which Bewick had been familiar in their native haunts were admirably rendered ; but where- he had to depend upon stuffed specimens or the representations of earlier artists, the result is scarcely so satisfactory. The 'Badger' and the 'Hedgehog,' for example, are unimpeachable ; the 'Bison' and 'Hippopotamus' are poor and unsuggestive.

It was probably some sense of this inequality which determined the subject of Bewick's next effort, the 'History of British Birds.' In this case he was much less likely to meet with difficulties in the way of obtaining an accurate idea of his subject, and frequently might either work directly from life or from newly shot specimens. His determination, in fact, in his own words, was 'to stick to nature as closely as he could' (Memoir, p. 164). The result, as may be seen from some of the beautiful water-colour drawings given to the British Museum by Miss Isabella Bewick in 1882, fully justified the wisdom of this resolve. The first volume, the 'Land Birds,' was published in 1797. The text, as before, was by Beilby, largely amended and edited by Bewick himself. The second volume, the 'Water Birds,' followed in 1804, the text this time being supplied by the Rev. Mr. Cotes, of Bedlington, Bewick's partnership with Beilby having been dissolved. To both volumes large additions were made in the succeeding issues, both in the way of illustrations and vignettes. In the eighth edition of 1847, published by Bewick's son [see ], the book was rearranged by Mr. John Hancock, a Newcastle naturalist, to suit the no-