Biographical Anecdotes of William Hogarth, With a Catalogue of His Works

Respect and gratitude having engaged me to compile a memoir of my deceased Master and Patron Mr. Bowyer, in the same performance I included anecdotes of all the eminent persons any way connected with him. A note of about a page's length was allotted to Hogarth. While it was printing, Mr. Walpole's Fourth Volume on the subject of English Painters came out, and was followed by an immediate rage for collecting every scrap of our Artist's designs. Persevering in my enquiries among my friends, I had now amassed so much intelligence relative to these engravings, that it could no longer be crowded into the situation originally meant for it. I was therefore advised to publish it in the form of a sixpenny pamphlet. This intended publication, however, grew up by degrees into a three-shilling book, and, within a year and a half afterwards, was swelled into almost its present bulk, at the price of six shillings. Such was the origin and progress of the following sheets, which, with many corrections, &c. have now reached a Third Edition.
J. N.
Nov. 10, 1785.

J. N.
Nov. 1, 1782.