him when a boy at Brentford.

Whatever defects Turner, the barber, may have had as a father, neglect of his son’s talents was not one of them, and, though very careful for the pence, he showed that he could make a pecuniary sacrifice when he had a chance of furthering his son’s prospects, for he refused to allow him to become the apprentice of one architect who offered to take him for nothing, and paid the whole of a legacy he had been left to place him with another, and we may presume a better one.

The information given by Mr. Thornbury about his early training, scholastic and professional, is very meagre, inconsecutive, and puzzling. According to him it was in 1785 that Turner, having been previously taught reading, but not writing, by his father, went to his first school, which was kept by Mr. John White, at New Brentford; in 1786 or 1787, by which time at least his destination for an artist’s career appears to have been settled, he was sent to “Mr. Palice, a floral drawing-master,” at an Academy in Soho, and in 1788, to a school kept by a Mr. Coleman at Margate; at some time before 1789, to Mr. Thomas Malton, a perspective draughtsman, who kept a school in Long Acre, and in this year to Mr. Hardwick, the architect, and to the school of the Royal Academy. He also went to Paul Sandby’s drawing school in St. Martin’s Lane. During all, or nearly all this time, he was, according to Mr. Thornbury, employed: 1. In making drawings at home to sell. 2. In colouring prints for John Raphael Smith, the engraver, printseller, and miniature painter. 3. Out sketching with Girtin. 4. Making drawings of an evening at Dr. Monro’s[7] in the Adelphi. 5. Washing in backgrounds for Mr. Porden. If he was really employed in this way from 1785 to 1789, and could only read and not write when he began this extraordinary course of training, it is no wonder that he remained illiterate all his life, or that his mind was utterly incapacitated for taking in and assimilating knowledge in the usual way. Spending a few months at a day school, and a few more at a “floral drawing master,” then a few more at school at Margate, making drawings for sale, colouring prints, fruitlessly studying perspective, bandied about from school master to drawing master, and from drawing master to architect—such a life for a young mind from ten to fourteen years of age is enough to spoil the finest intellectual digestion.

One fact, however, comes clear out of all this confusion, that of regular and ordinary schooling he had little or none, and there is no reason to suppose that it was because of the peculiar quality of his mind that he always spoke and wrote like a dunce. He never had a fair chance of acquiring in his youth more than a traveller’s knowledge of his own language, and so his mind had a very small outlet through the ordinary channels of speech. On the other hand, faculties of drawing and composition were trained to the utmost, and this compensated him in a measure. His mind had only one entrance, his eye, and only one exit, his hand; but they were both exceptional, and cultivated exceptionally.

CHATEAU D’AMBOISE.
From “Rivers of France.”

There was, however, much of pleasure in this life for a boy like Turner, for though he evidently worked hard, he liked work and the work he had to do was especially congenial to him. He met friends and encouragers on all sides; from his father to his school-fellows. However much reason he may have had for disappointment in later years, there was none in his early life. He was “found out” in his childhood. Encouraged by his father, with his drawings finding a ready sale to such men as Mr. Henderson, Mr. Crowle, and Mr. Tomkison, with plenty of employment in no slavish mean work for such a youngster, such as colouring prints and putting in backgrounds to drawings, with Mr. Porden generously offering to take him as an apprentice for nothing, with a kind friend like Dr. Monro always willing to give him a supper and half-a-crown for sketches of the country near his residence at Bushey, or the result of an evening’s copying of the then best attainable water colours; his life was far more agreeable, far more tended to make him think well of the world and of the people in it than has been usually represented, and probably as good as he could have had for attaining early proficiency in his art. London at that time was not a bad place for a landscape artist. It was neither so clouded nor so sooty as it is now; there were healthier trees in it, and more of them, a more picturesque and a purer river, and within less than half an hour’s walk from Maiden Lane there were green fields, for north of the British Museum the country was still open.

But he was not entirely dependent upon his art and his employers for enjoyment, or for forming his opinion of the human race. There were houses at which he visited and where he was received warmly. When at school at Margate he got an “introduction to the pleasant family of a favourite school-fellow;” at Bristol there was Mr. Narraway,[8] a fellmonger in Broadmead, and an old friend of his father, at whose house he drew two of the children and his own portrait; and at the house of Mr. William Frederick Wells, the artist, he was evidently one of the family, as is proved by the charmingly tender reminiscences of Mrs. Wheeler.

A man