"Varley, water-colour painter and astrologer, it was," says Gilchrist, "who encouraged Blake to take authentic sketches of certain among his most frequent spiritual visitants. The visionary faculty was so much under control, that at the wish of a friend he could summon before his abstracted gaze any of the familiar forms and faces he was asked for." This was during the favourable and befitting hours of night, from nine or ten in the evening till one or two, or perhaps three or four o'clock in the morning; Varley sitting by, "sometimes slumbering and sometimes waking." Varley would say, "Draw me Moses," or "David"; or would call for a likeness of Julius Cæsar, or Cassivelaunus, or Edward III., or some other great historical personage. Blake would answer, "There he is." And paper and pencil being at hand, he would begin drawing with the utmost alacrity and composure, looking up from time to time as if he had a real sitter before him.... Sometimes Blake had to wait for the vision's appearance: sometimes it would come at call. At others, in the midst of his portrait, he would suddenly leave off, and, in his ordinary quiet tones, and with the same matter-of-fact air another might say, "It rains," would remark, "I can't go on--it is gone: I must wait till it returns;" or--"It has moved--the mouth is gone;" or--"He frowns: he is displeased with my portrait of him." In sober daylight, if criticisms were hazarded by the profane on the character or drawing of any of these visions, "Oh, it's all right," Blake would calmly reply. "It _must_ be right: I saw it so." Among the personages whom Blake then drew were the Builder of the Pyramids, Edward III.--with a peculiar protrusion of skull, said by Blake to be characteristic of tyrants in the spirit world--a man who instructed Blake in painting in his dreams, David, Uriah, Bathsheba, the Ghost of a Flea--to which allusion has been made above--Joseph and Mary and the room they were seen in, Old Parr at the age of forty, and many others which are still extant. But allowing this want of balance to account for the abnormal variations of vanity, jealousy, and violence, we have a residuum of manly independence, sweet austerity, and faithful devotion that is rare in any annals, most of all in the annals of art. What a touching story it is of the young artist who came to Blake and complained that he was deserted by his inspiration. Blake turned to his faithful wife: "_It is just so with us (is it not?) for weeks together, when the visions desert us. What do we do then, Kate?" "We kneel down and pray, Mr. Blake._" What pathetic dignity there is in his often-repeated saying, when time after time his prophetical books were returned upon his hands--"_Well, it is published elsewhere_--_and beautifully bound._"