More on Hopwood."I enquire whether you are acquainted with a likeness of him in one of a series of designs made by made by Mr Richard Cook to illustrate the poem of the Lady of the Lake. - He is therein represented (if my memory does not deceive me) in the character of Brian denouncing all those of the Clan who may be unfaithful to Roderic Dhu. The edition of Scott's Poems in which this design will be found was published by Longman and Co 1811. The plate was engraved by C. Warren and is (in my opinion) one of the works of art which confers honourable distinction on Great Britain..." Mentioning Varley. Going on to discuss at length the"plate engraved by your father of Cupid and Psyche." Concluding with a long discussion on the state of engraving in the first decade of the nineteenth century: "Your father was some ten years older than me, and consequently he had, when I made his acquaintance, acquired some knowledge in advance of me, as to the degraded state of the profession he was destined to pursue. Previously to the French Revolution (1789) England had an extensive export trade in Engraving. This the war that ensued, entirely destroyed. When your father entered upon his professional career, Book embellishments were the only sources of employment for engravers, and the remuneration which resulted from the speculative publishers of embellished works, enabled Bachelor engravers only to live, in humble lodgings and on modest fare. All this your father knew, and hence he displayed the daring that characterised his speculations (the Grave) and the Canterbury Pilgrimage. I am of the opinion they were the earliest speculations of their kind that were entered into after the failure of Boydell and the commencement of the War. I am of opinion also that your father's tastes and sympathies were controlled by circumstances; and that under other circumstances he would not have abandoned the art to travel about the country to obtain subscribers to his projects. Nor were the adverse circumstances mentioned, the only evils of which engravers in London had to complain for the Royal Academy had by its laws of exclusion, placed its ban before them. It received into its body Flower painters, enamel painters, and die sinkers, while it marked engravers with degradation. These adverse circumstances your father contended against in a way that did him honour, and it is not impossible that the mental friction they occasioned him was more than his constitution could bear."

Proof Engraving. Scene from Lady of the Lake. Painted by Richard Cook. Engraved by Charles Warren. Longmans, March 20 1811. This is the engraving mentioned in Letter 4 above where the central figure, a long-haired wild-looking old man, is said by Pye to be based on the engraver James Hopwood.