1794. "Turner used this book on his tour through the Midland counties to the Dee valley in North Wales in the summer of 1794. The first few pages are given over to a précis of several possible itineraries, some broadly indicated by a few principal towns, others detailed routes naming many small villages. He may have consulted a friend who knew some parts of the region intimately. He seems to have planned the trip to furnish subjects for an important commission: he had been asked to supply views for J. Walker’s Copper-Plate Magazine for which, and for three other magazines published by Walker, The Itinerant, The Ladies’ Pocket Magazine and the Pocket Print Magazine, thirty-one plates were engraved between 1794 and 1797.1 A drawing of Flint from Park-Gate (National Museum Wales, Cardiff),2 which supplied the subject for one view, is probably a page from this book. This was the first time Turner had been asked to provide a set of topographical views for publication, although he had dreamt of such a work when he made his Avon and Malmesbury drawings in 1791 (see the Bristol and Malmesbury sketchbook, Tate; Turner Bequest VI). He drew on earlier tours as well as this one, but the excursion opened up a wide new area of England to him and he made full use of it. The Marford Mill sketchbook (Tate; Turner Bequest XX) was also taken on the journey, as well as the sheaf of loose sheets catalogued in relation to this tour."
