ities for which it was not
suited. The method called for extraordinary talents in planning,
drawing, cutting, and printing, and it resulted in impressions that
could not escape a certain heaviness of effect when compared with
traditional work. Jackson's prints in this style are both daring and
original, but no later woodcutter had either the desire or the temerity
to follow his example. The method remained a dead end in chiaroscuro.

[Footnote 11: Andrea Andreani in 1599 published ten plates after
cartoons of Mantegna's nine paintings, _The Triumph of Julius
Caesar_ (B. 11), printed from four blocks in variations of gray.
But Mantegna's cartoons were basically drawings in monochrome, and
Andreani's fine chiaroscuros did not differ appreciably from the
usual examples.]

[Illustration:
Tailpiece in _L'Histoire naturelle eclaircie dans une de ses
parties principales, l'oryctologie_, by D. d'Argenville, De Bure,
Paris, 1755. This is one of the cuts Jackson made between 1725-1730.
Actual size.]

Jackson and His Work

_England: Obscure Beginnings_

Little is known of Jackson's early years. It is assumed that he was born
in England about 1700, although many accounts, probably based upon
Nagler, have him born in 1701. Papillon[12] conjectures that he studied
painting and engraving on wood with "an English painter" named "Ekwits,"
but is not sure he remembers the name correctly. He believes this artist
engraved most of the head pieces and ornaments in Mattaire's _Latin
Classics_, published by J. and R. Tonson and J. Watts in London, 1713,
and remarks on similarities with Jackson's style. Chatto[13] believes
these cuts were executed by Elisha Kirkall, interpreting the initials
_EK_ appearing on one of the prints to refer to this engraver rather
than to "Ekwits." He goes on to assume that Kirkall also engraved the
blocks for Croxall's edition of _Aesop's Fables_, 1722, by the same
publisher, and adds that Jackson was probably his apprentice and might
have had some share in their execution. Most accounts of Jackson, taking
Chatto's word, note him as a pupil of Kirkall.

[Footnote 12: Papillon, 1766, vol. 1, p. 323. Most probably
Papillon confused "Ekwits" with Elisha Kirkall.]

[Footnote 13: Chatto and Jackson, 1861 (1st ed. 1839), p. 448.]

Linton[14] believes that only Kirkall or Jackson could have made the
cuts, "unless some _Sculptor ignotus_ is to be cre