on you but did not. He is also a happy abstract, known by all his friends as the most innocent forgetter of his own interests. He is nephew to the late Mr. Cowper the poet. You would like him much. I continue painting miniatures, and I improve more and more, as all my friends tell me. But my principal labour at this time is engraving plates for Cowper's Life,[1] a work of magnitude, which Mr. Hayley is now labouring at with all his matchless industry, and which will be a most valuable acquisition to literature, not only on account of Mr. Hayley's composition, but also as it will contain letters of Cowper to his friends—perhaps, or rather certainly, the very best letters that were ever published. My wife joins with me in love to you and Mrs. Butts, hoping that her joy is now increased, and yours also, in an increase of family and of health and happiness.—I remain, dear Sir, ever yours sincerely, William Blake.
Hayley in 1802 (see note i, p. 88): the Johnson family are unable to say what has become of this likeness.
- ↑ The Life and Posthumous Writings of William Cowper . . . by William Hayley . . . 1803 [-1804]. 3 vols. 4to. Contains the following plates by Blake: i. Portrait of Cowper, after Romney; ii. Portrait of Mrs. Cowper, mother of the poet, after D. Heins; iii. Portrait of Cowper, after Lawrence; iv. The Pheasant's Nest, Cowper's tame Hares; v. A View of St. Edmund's Chapel, in the Church of East Dereham, containing the Grave of William Cowper; vi. A Sketch of the Monument Erected in the Church of East Dereham in Norfolk, In Memory of WilHam Cowper.
