Page:William Blake, his life, character and genius.djvu/11



the greater part of this work was written, I learned through a friend of the existence of two ladies, daughters of William John Blake, of Southampton, who claim to be second cousins of William Blake, the subject of this work. Their father always spoke of the poet and artist as his near kinsman, and his widow left a document in which she traces the family back, through Admiral Blake, to a remote period of English history. This William John Blake was the son of a William Blake, whose father, grandfather, and great-grandfather were John Blakes.

The family was originally settled in Somersetshire, to which county Admiral Blake belonged; but one branch of it subsequently migrated to Wilts, and it was from this branch that the poet was descended. In a work on Blake's art, upon which I am now engaged, I propose to give as full details of the pedigree as can be obtained.

The portrait of Blake given as frontispiece is a photographic reproduction of the miniature from the life by John Linnell.