Spencer was a miniature-painter of much celebrity, contemporaneous with
Hogarth. He was originally a gentleman’s servant, but having a natural
turn for art, he amused himself with drawing. It happened that one of
the family with whom he lived sat for a portrait to a miniature-painter,
and when the work was completed, it was shown to Spencer, who said he
thought he could copy it. He was allowed to make the attempt, when his
success was so great, that the family he lived with at once patronised
him, and by their interest he became a fashionable painter of the day.