Whether or not the work deemed by L. E. X. to be the first exhibited by
Turner may have been in water-colours, or be still in existence, I leave to
other replicants, availing myself of the occasion to ask him or you,
whether in 1787 two works of W. Turner, at Mr. G. Turner's, Walthamstow,
"No. 471. Dover Castle," "No. 601. Wanstead House," were not, in fact, his
first tilt in that arena of which he was the champion at the hour of his
{90} death? Whether in the two following years he appeared at all in the
ring; and, if not, why not? although in the succeeding 1790 he again threw
down the glaive in the "No. 644. The Archbishop's Palace, Lambeth," being
then set down as "_T._ W. Turner;" reappearing in 1791 as "W. Turner, of
Maiden Lane, Covent Garden," with "No. 494. King John's Palace, Eltham;"
"No. 560. Sweakley, near Uxbridge." In the horizon of art (strange to say,
and yet to be explained!) this luminary glows no more till 1808, when he
had "on the line" (?) several views of Fonthill, as well as the "Tenth
Plague of Egypt," purchased of course by the proprietor of that princely
mansion, as it is found mentioned in Warner's _Walks near Bath_ to be that
same year adorning the walls of one of the saloons.