Gents Mag 1809 p.1141

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	Gentleman's Magazine 1809 p.1141 musick. The fortunate incident which led him to a cultivation of his principal art was simply this: "in his youth he observed a great singularity of countenance in a stranger at church: his parents, to whom he spoke of it, desired him to describe the person - he siezed a pencil, and delineated the features from memory with such a strength of resemblance as amazed and delighted his affectionate parents. The applause that he received from this accidental performance excited him to draw with more serious application." In his fifteenth year he received some encouragement and assistance from one John Williamson, whose character appears to to have been a favourite with Romney, and is represented by his Biographer in the same favourable light. This was a gentleman of small fortune near Whitehaven, who had "passionately devoted himself to natural philosophy, musick, mechanicks, and, above all, to the fascinating study of alchemy," which produced his ruin, but attended, in our opinion, with a circumstance that detracts very much from the general character here given of him. This madman, for if he was not that he was worse, had bestowed "much time, trouble, and money, on preparations for the grand experiment of making gold. He drew nigh the decisive hour; and was watching, with peculiar anxiety, his furnace, whose fire he had kept, with the utmost regularity, for nine months, when his wife requested him to attend some of her company at the tea-table. Her persevering importuning induced him, though with great reluctance, to comply with her request. Never was conjugal complaisance more unfortunate, except in the case of our first parents. While the projector was attending his ladies, his furnace blew up, and all his high-raised hopes were utterly demolished by the explosion. In consequence of this event he conceived an antipathy against his wife so vehement that he could not endure the idea of living with her again." This was bad; but worse a consequence of this man's connexion with Romney will soon appear. He gave Romney lessons in his art, who repaid him by compassion and esteem. When Romney left home, he was placed under the care of a cabinet-maker of Lancaster, who, perceiving his bias, suggested to his father the idea of making him a painter, and at the same time recommended a young travelling artist as his master. This person, whose name was Steele, employed his pupil in other matters than what belonged to his art. Having induced a young lady to elope with him to Scotland, "he employed his young pupil in conducting the delicate and private business of his love, instead of confining him to the severer labours of the pencil." In this service Romney contracted a violent fever, during which he was attended by a young female, with whom, on his recovery, he entered into a precipitate marriage, Oct. 14, 1756. The inconvenience of such a step was soon experienced; but instead of a wife and two children proving a spur to his exertions, he determined, after the example of his friend the alchemist, to leave them; and having given them about 70l. set out for the Metropolis, and never saw his wife more until he returned to Kendal, in the last year of his life! Mr, Hayley endeavours to soften these circumstances with a friendly hand, but we cannot say with much success. During his residence in the North he practised mostly in historical paintings; and Mr. Hayley details his progress, and specifies his principle pictures with critical taste. Having become acquainted with Sterne, he delineated some of the comic scenes of that Writer. His favourite composition was Obadiah making his bow to Dr. Slop, as the Doctor is falling in the dirty lane; but we have here an exquisite engraving of another picture, representing the introduction of the bemired Doctor in the parlour of Mr, Shandy, a work of great comic power, and now in the possession of Sir Alan Chambre. He painted portraits also at York, Lancaster, &c. and some historical pieces of the more serious kind from Sterne and Shakespeare. In 1762 he arrived in London, where his first patron was one in whose praise all who have the happiness to know him will eagerly join, that truly worthy and ingenious man, Daniel Braithwaite, Esq. formerly Comptroller of the Foreign Post-office. Romney, under his friendly directions, began painting portraits for
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