Though but a blacksmith and a farrier, he studied art so diligently, and acquired so much distinction, that his mistress afterwards accepted the painter whom she had before rejected as the blacksmith.

Flaxman, however, married his wife before he had acquired any distinction whatever as an artist.

He was merely a skilful and promising pupil.

When Sir Joshua Reynolds heard of his marriage, he exclaimed, "Flaxman is ruined for an artist!" But it was not so.

When Flaxman's wife heard of the remark, she said, "Let us work and economize; I will never have it said that Ann Denbam ruined John Flaxman as an artist." They economized accordingly.