This system did not exactly quadrate with the views of his employer, who, naturally enough, wished his pupil to be a workman and not an artist. Moreover, Chantrey, finding his tastes in this respect perpetually thwarted, and his desire becoming uncontrollable, grew much too enthusiastic in his aspirations to be longer limited or restrained by ordinary circumstances. Therefore, though only six months of his term of servitude remained unexpired, with the impatience of genius he gave his master all the wealth he possessed to cancel the indentures, gained a little money by taking portraits, repaired to London, and, thus thrown into the mighty vortex, determined to triumph. But with the hereditary caution and common sense, which were finely exhibited by him throughout life, he made “the hardest circumstance a helper and a slave,” and at first sought employment as assistant to a wood-carver, that he might live by the craft he had resolved to leave, while pursuing those studies that were so nobly rewarded, rather than make any premature attempt to win that fame which he instinctively felt must one day be his in no small measure. He reached the metropolis in his twenty-second year, and shortly after his arrival was induced to pay a visit to Ireland, with the intention of making a tour through that country; but while in Dublin he suffered so severely from a fever, that his life was for some time despaired of. Fortunately, he was restored to health, and returned to London, having during the illness lost his hair, which he never recovered. His appearance was fine and prepossessing; his mouth was beautifully formed; and he was complimented on bearing a remarkable resemblance to the greatest of English dramatists. In disposition he was frank, fearless, and communicative; and his affability and familiarity in company were acknowledged: but, at the same time, he was a man of the world, and would never, for a momentary triumph, commit himself by a conversational indiscretion.