ent engraver, whose manner is curiously
traceable through much of Blake's after work. Even in the formal
atmosphere of the Royal Academy's antique school, Blake remained an
opinionated and curiously "detached" scholar, with singular critical
notions, with half-expressed or very boldly expressed theories as to
art, religion, and most other things. In 1782 he married a young woman
of equally humble derivation, who could not even sign the marriage
register. He developed her character, educated her mind, and made her a
devoted and companionable wife, full of faith in him. Their curious and
retired menage was as happy in a practical and mundane aspect as could
be hoped from even a normal one.

In 1780 he began to exhibit, his first picture being 'The Death of Earl
Godwin.' After exhibiting five others, however, ending with 'Jacob's
Dream,' he withdrew altogether from public advertisement. Several
devoted patrons--especially Mr. Linnell, and a certain Mr. Thomas Butts,
who bought incessantly, anything and everything,--seized upon all he
drew and painted. In his literary undertakings he was for the most part
his own editor and printer and publisher. His career in verse and prose
began early. In 1783 came forth the charming collection 'Poetical
Sketches,' juvenile as the fancies of his boyish days, but full of a
sensitive appreciation of nature worthy of a mature heart, and expressed
with a diction often exquisite. The volume was not really public nor
published, but printed by the kindly liberality of two friends, one of
them Flaxman. In 1787, "under the direction of the spirit of his dead
brother," Robert, he decided on publishing a new group of lyrics and
fancies, 'Songs of Innocence,' by engraving the text of the poems and
its marginal embellishments on copper--printing the pages in various
tints, coloring or recoloring them by hand, and even binding them, with
his wife's assistance. The medium for mixing his tints, by the by, was
"revealed to him by Saint Joseph."

With this volume--now a rarity for the bibliophile--began Blake's system
of giving his literary works and many of his extraordinary artistic
productions their form and being. Like a poet-printer of our own day,
Mr. William Morris, Blake insisted that each page of text, all his
delicate illustrations, every cover even, should pass through his own
fingers, or through those of his careful and submissive helpmeet. The
expense of their paper was the chief one to the