Page:The letters of William Blake (1906).djvu/153

 Rh become a goddess in my eyes, and my friends in Sussex say that I excel in the pursuit I have a great many orders, and they multiply. Now, let me entreat you to give me orders to furnish every accommodation in my power to receive you and Mrs. Butts. I know my cottage is too narrow for your ease and comfort. We have one room in which we could make a bed to lodge you both; and if this is sufficient, it is at your service. But as beds and rooms and accommodations are easily procured by one on the spot, permit me to offer my service in either way; either in my cottage, or in a lodging in the village, as is most agreeable to you, if you and Mrs. Butts should think Bognor a pleasant relief from business in the summer. It will give me the utmost delight to do my best.

Sussex is certainly a happy place, and Felpham in particular is the sweetest spot on earth; at least it is so to me and my good wife, who

vicinity of Felpham are likely to have been among their number. It is curious to see that in the report of the proceedings of his trial on the charge of sedition in August 1803, Blake is described as a Miniature Painter; and that he himself in the course of his own defence remarks that Scholfield had called him a Military Painter, "I suppose mistaking the words Miniature Painter, which he might have heard me called." There are, doubtless, a fair number of Blake's miniatures in existence remaining for an industrious collector to unearth. The specimens with which I am acquainted, if they lack the delicacy and grace of the finest, compare favourably enough with ordinary work of the period.