was his enthusiasm, that some acute and sensible persons who heard him expatiate, shook their heads, and hinted that he was an extraordinary man, and that there might be something in the matter. One of his brethren, an artist of some note, employed him frequently in drawing the portraits of those who appeared to him in visions. The most propitious time for those "angel-visits" was from nine at night till five in the morning; and so docile were his spiritual sitters, that they appeared at the wish of his friends. Sometimes, however, the shape which he desired to draw was long in appearing, and he sat with his pencil and paper ready and his eyes idly roaming in vacancy; all at once the vision came upon him, and he began to work like one possest. He was requested to draw the likeness of Sir William Wallace-the eye of Blake sparkled, for he admired heroes. "William Wallace!" he exclaimed, "I see him now-there, there, how noble he looks-reach me my things!" Having drawn for some time, with the same care of hand and steadiness of eye, as if a living sitter had been before him, Blake stopt suddenly, and said, "I cannot finish him-Edward the First has stept in between him and me. "That's lucky," said his friend, "for I want the portrait of Edward too." Blake took another sheet of paper, and sketched the features of Plantagenet; upon which his majesty politely vanished, and the artist finished the head of Wallace. "And pray, Sir,” said a gentleman, who heard Blake's friend tell his story-" was Sir William Wallace an heroic-looking man? And what sort of personage was Edward?" The answer was: "there they are, Sir, both framed and hanging on the wall behind you, judge for yourself." "I looked (says my informant) and saw two warlike heads of the size of common life. That of Wallace was noble and heroic, that of Edward stern and bloody. The first had the front of a god, the latter the aspect of a demon." The friend who obliged me with these anecdotes on observing the interest which I took in the subject, said, "I know much about Blake-I was his companion for nine years. I have sat beside him from ten at night till three in the morning, sometimes slumbering and sometimes waking, but Blake never slept; he sat with a pencil and paper drawing portraits of those whom I most desired to see. I will show you, Sir, some of these works." He took out a large book filled with drawings, opened it, and continued, "Observe the poetic fervour of that face-it is Pindar as he stood a conqueror in the Olympic games. And this lovely creature. Corinna, who conquered in poetry in the same place. That lady is Lais, the courtesan-with the impudence which is part of her profession, she stept in between Blake and Corinna, and he was obliged to paint her to get her away. There! that is a face of a different stamp-can you conjecture who he is?" "Some scoundrel, I should think, Sir." "There now-that is a strong proof of the accuracy of Blake--he is a scoundrel indeed! The very individual task-master whom Moses slew in Egypt. And who is this nowonly imagine who this is?" “Other than a good one, I doubt, Sir." "You are right, it is a fiend-he resembles, and this is remarkable, two men who shall be nameless; one is a great lawyer, and the other-I wish I durst name him-is a suborner of false witnesses. This other head now? this speaks for itself—it is the head of Herod; how like an eminent officer in the army!" 64 He closed the book, and taking out a small panel from a private drawer, said, "this is the last which I shall show you; but it is the greatest curiosity of all. Only look at the splendour of the colouring and the original character of the thing!" "I see," said I, a naked figure with a strong body and a short neck—with burning eyes which long for moisture, and a face worthy of a murderer, holding a bloody cup in his clawed hands, out of which it seems eager to drink. I never saw any shape so strange, nor did I ever see any colouring so curiously splendid-a kind of glistening green and dusky gold, beautifully varnished. But what in the world is it?" "It is a ghost, Sir-the ghost of a flea-a spiritualization of the thing!" "He saw this in a vision then," I said. "I'll tell you all about it, Sir. I called on him one evening, and found Blake more than usually excited. He told me he had seen a wonderful thing-the ghost of a flea! And did you make a drawing of him? I inquired. No, indeed, said he, I wish I had, but I shall, if he appears again! He looked earnestly into a corner of the room, and then said, here he is-reach me my things-I shall keep my eye on him. There he comes! his eager tongue whisking out of his mouth, a cup in his hand to hold blood, and covered with a scaly skin of gold and green; as he described him so he drew him." Visions, such as are said to arise in the sight of those who indulge in opium, were frequently present to Blake, nevertheless he sometimes desired to see a spirit in vain. "For many years," said he, "I longed to see Satan-I never could believe that he was the vulgar fiend which our legends represent him--I imagined him a classic spirit, such as he appeared to him of Uz, with some of his original splendour about him. At last I saw him. I was going up stairs in the dark, when suddenly a light came streaming amongst my feet, I turned round, and there he was looking fiercely at me through the iron grating of my staircase window. I called for my things-Katherine thought the fit of song was on me, and brought me pen and ink-I said, hush!-never mind-this will do-as he appeared so I drew him—there he is." Upon this, Blake took out a piece of paper with a grated window sketched on it, while through the bars glared the most frightful phantom that ever man imagined. Its eyes were large and like live coals-its teeth as long as those of a harrow, and the claws seemed such as might appear in the distempered dream of a clerk in the Herald's office. "It is the gothic fiend of our legends, said Blake-the true devil— all else are apocryphal." These stories are scarcely credible, yet there can be no doubt of their accuracy. Another friend, on whose veracity I have the fullest dependence, called one evening on Blake, and found him sitting with a pencil and a panel, drawing a portrait with all the seeming anxiety of a man who is conscious that he has got a fastidious sitter; he looked and drew, and drew and looked, yet no living soul was visible. "Disturb me not," said he, in a whisper, "I have one sitting to me." "Sitting to you!" exclaimed his astonished visitor, "where is he, and what is he?—I see no one." "But I see him, Sir," answered Blake haughtily, "there he is, his name is Lot-you may read of him in the Scripture. He is sitting for his portrait." Had he always thought so idly, and wrought on such visionary matters, this memoir would have been the story of a madman, instead of the life of a man of genius, some of whose works are worthy of any age or nation. Even while he was indulging in these laughable fancies, and seeing visions at the request of his friends, he conceived, and drew, and engraved, one of the noblest of all his productions. the Inventions for the Book of Job. "He accomplished this series in a small room, which served him for kitchen, bedchamber, and study, where he had no other companion but his faithful Katherine, and no larger income than some seventeen or eighteen shillings a week. Of these Inventions, as the artist loved to call them, there are twentyone, representing the Man of Uz sustaining his dignity amidst the inflictions of Satan, the reproaches of his friends, and the insults of his wife. It was in such things that Blake shone; the Scripture overawed his imagination, and he was too devout to attempt aught beyond a literal embodying of the majestic scene. He goes step by step with the narrative; always simple, and often sublimenever wandering from the subject, nor overlaying the text with the weight of his own exuberant fancy. The passages, embodied, will show with what lofty themes he presumed to grapple. 1. Thus |