wood-engraving had fallen into the lowest repute. Few of its specimens
were superior to the pictures on street ballads of the present day. To
explain Bewick's improvements would occupy too much of our space, but, we
may observe, generally that the engravings of the above period were mere
patches of black and white, till Bewick introduced those beautiful reliefs,
or varieties of light and shade which principally form the pictorial
effect of an engraving. By this means he raised wood-engraving from a
state of contempt to the rank of one of the _fine arts_.

The first specimen of his talents by which Bewick made himself publicly
known was a cut of an old hound, for which, in 1755, he received a premium
from the Society of Arts. The block had been cut for an edition of Gay's
fables; the complete work appeared in 1779; and immediately attracted
general attention by the striking superiority of its embellishments, which
were all from wood-cuts executed by Bewick and his younger brother John,
who, when Beilby and he entered into partnership, had become their
apprentice. From this time the reputation of the artist went on increasing
steadily, and he produced a succession of works which very soon gave
altogether a new character to his art itself.

Bewick's principal work, or that which established his fame, was his
_History of Quadrupeds_, which appeared in 1790. He had been employed many
years in preparing this publication, all the cuts in which were not only
engraved by himself or his brother, but were all copied from his own
drawings. He had cultivated his early talent for the delineation of
animals with unwearied industry: he had not the advantages of academical
studies, which education in the metropolis might have afforded him, but
_he drew from life_, taking sketches of all the striking specimens that
came under his notice, and visiting whatever menageries of exotic animals
were brought to Newcastle.[2] Thus he studied assiduously _from nature_,