Gainsborough went sketching, when a schoolboy, in the
woods of Sudbury; and at twelve he was a confirmed artist: he was
a keen observer and a hard worker,--no picturesque feature of any
scene he had once looked upon, escaping his diligent pencil.
William Blake, a hosier's son, employed himself in drawing designs
on the backs of his father's shop-bills, and making sketches on the
counter. Edward Bird, when a child only three or four years old,
would mount a chair and draw figures on the walls, which he called
French and English soldiers. A box of colours was purchased for
him, and his father, desirous of turning his love of art to
account, put him apprentice to a maker of tea-trays! Out of this
trade he gradually raised himself, by study and labour, to the rank
of a Royal Academician.
Hogarth, though a very dull boy at his lessons, took pleasure in
making drawings of the letters of the alphabet, and his school
exercises were more remarkable for the ornaments with which he
embellished them, than for the matter of the exercises themselves.
In the latter respect he was beaten by all the blockheads of the
school, but in his adornments he stood alone. His father put him
apprentice to a silversmith, where he learnt to draw, and also to
engrave spoons and forks with crests and ciphers.
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