success in this country, and our artists are now approaching to a successful rivalry with those of Great Britain and France. The first man who practised the art to any considerable extent in this country, was Nathaniel Hurd, who engraved on copper in Boston, about the year 1750. Paul Revere, also an inhabitant of Boston, was a contemporary with Hurd, and at first they both engraved caricatures. The latter soon turned his attention to higher aims, and among his first efforts was a portrait of his friend, Dr. Mayhew. In 1766, he engraved a picture emblematic of the repeal of the stamp act. This, and a caricature called The Seventeen Rescinders, were very popular and had an extensive sale. In 1770, Mr Revere published a print representing the massa. cre in King street, (Boston,) on the memorable fifth of March; and in 1774, he engraved another of similar size, representing the landing of the British troops in Boston. A few copies of all of these are extant, though extremely rare. 1775, he engraved the plates, made the press, and printed the bills of the paper money ordered by the provincial congress of Massachusetts, then in session. He died in 1780.

In

About the year 1771, an engraver by the name of Amos Doolittle, practised the art with success in New Haven, Connecticut. He executed an engraving in 1775, showing the town of Lexington, and the English troops commanded by Major Pitcairn, firing on the militia.

An Englishman by the name of Smithers, set tled in Philadelphia in 1773. He was originally a gun engraver, but applied himself to a finer department of the art. He was employed to engrave the stamps for the continental money.

Jacob Perkins, the celebrated American mechanic and philosopher, used the graver for a short time between the year 1786 and 1790. He was employed in making stamps for the Massachusetts' mint, at a time when each state had the right of coining money. He afterward engraved a check-plate for the paper money of Massachusetts, to prevent counterfeits. The chief service which Mr. Perkins has rendered to the art, is his invention of a mode of softening and afterwards hardening steel, for purposes of engraving. This scientific invention has done much for the art, for engravings on steel are not only more delicately executed than on copper, but the plates when thus hardened are rendered tenfold more durable than copper. We have seen the first and the fifty thousandth impression from one of these hardened plates, in which no difference was visible. Mr. Perkins (who has been a great many years in England) and Mr. Heath, have brought the art to great perfection. A process of multiplying engravings on steel, for bank notes, called siderography, is now extensively used in this country, and greatly lessens the labour of engraving for this purpose.

The first mezzotinto engraving executed in this country, was by an Englishman named Jennings, who about the year 1774, engraved in this style a portrait of Nathaniel Hurd. In 1783, Peter R. Maverick, a silversmith, commenced etching and line engraving in New York city, which business he followed with success for many years. In 1791, William Rollinson, an Englishman, made his first attempts at engraving in New York. Among his first essays was a portrait of Washington, done in the stippling man

ner, but with small success. In 1812, he invented a machine for ruling waved lines on the margins of bank notes. Rollinson and Peter Maverick, son of Peter R. Maverick, were among the first, and, for a long time, the only bank note engravers in this country. Within a few years past, many improvements in that department of the art have been made, and the talents of our best engravers have been employed in executing their vignettes. We might mention the names of many excellent engravers among us, but delicacy forbids, lest an invidious distinction might be made. We may be allowed to say, however, that A. B. Durand, who has left the burine and taken up the pencil, is one of the best engravers our country has ever produced. His Ariadne, after a painting by John Vanderlyn, is a beautiful specimen of line engraving, and successfully vies with that perfection which distinguishes the works of Sharpe.

CHAPTER II.

Engraving on Wood-Its Antiquity-Engraving in the Thirteenth Century-Causes of its Invention or Revival in the Fourteenth Century-Cards-Block-Books-Early Printers and Printing-First Printed Books Illustrated-Albert Durer and his Works-His Contemporaries and Successors-State of the Art in England-Bewick and his Works-The Art in this Country-Metallic Relief Engraving.

THE art of ENGRAVING ON WOOD is an ancient as well as a beautiful and legitimate mode of producing pictures. Because the books of the Chinese are now, and were, when first generally

known to Europeans, printed from engraved blocks, it has been generally supposed that to them may be attributed the honour of the invention of engraving on wood, and even of printing. But as that observing traveller, Marco Polo, who visited China in the fourteenth century, is silent upon this subject, their ignorance of the art is implied. Far earlier than this the forming of letters or other devices on wood, was probably known, for there can be little doubt that the bricks of Babylon were impressed with stamps made of wood. Mr. Lane found in one of the tombs in the Lybian mountains, a wooden stamp, which had evidently been used for a similar purpose; and Pliny mentions the fact that such stamps were used in his time for impressing earthen ware, and were called typi. In confirmation of Pliny's statement, Sir William Gell says that amphore and other vessels found at Pompeii were thus stamped. But the art of cutting letters and other figures, and, by means of a colouring mat. ter, transferring an impression from them to another substance, is undoubtedly of quite a modern origin. Papillon, a French writer and engraver, states that about the year 1286, a brother and sister of the name of Cunio, engraved eight pictures on wood, about nine inches by six in size, representing the actions of Alexander. The subjects are, 1. Alexander mounted on Bucephalus ; 2. His passage of the Granicus; 3. Cutting the Gordian Knot; 4. Alexander in the tent of Darius; 5. His presentation of Campaspe to Apelles; 6. Battle of Arbela; 7. Porus vanquished, and brought before Alexander; 8. Alexander entering Babylon in triumph

Papillon states that in a frontispiece decorated

with ornaments, there is an inscription which states the engraving to have been done by Allesandro Alberico Cunio, Cavalier, and Isabella Cunio, twin brother and sister, "first reduced, imagined, and attempted to be executed in relief, with a small knife on blocks of wood, made even and polished by this learned and dear sister; continued and finished by us together, at Ravenna, from the eight pictures of our invention, painted six times larger than here represented; engraved, explained by verse, and thus marked upon the paper to perpetuate the number of them, and to enable us to present them to our relations and friends in testimony of gratitude, friendship and affection. All this was done and finished by us when only sixteen years of age." This account has been disputed, but Papillon states that he had seen the engravings, and Mr. Ottley, a learned writer on the subject, believes it authentic.

About the close of the fourteenth century, two causes widely different in their character, operated favorably to produce the discovery, or rather (allowing the above account to be true,) the revival of the art of wood engraving. These causes were, the increasing demand for the bible, which the rapidly advancing intelligence of the age produced, and the equally rapid increase of the practice of card-playing among princes and people, clergy and laity. Monkish legends, represented by pictures and explained by inscriptions, were engraved on plates of brass and circulated, but as this process was too slow and expensive, it undoubtedly originated the idea of producing them more rapidly by a different process; and the card-makers, unable, by their method of