A r-y-l visit to a foreign capital, or, The ambassador not at home!! April 1817 / [graphic]

"The Princess of Wales and her suite in a carriage drawn by six horses arrive at the porte-cochère of the British Embassy in Vienna. At the gate and in front of the horses is a mounted groom or outrider blowing a trumpet, from which issue the words: 'Vite! Vite!! 7 Lits de Maitre--13-- de Domestique--!!' Facing him is a fat porter, who keeps one leaf of the gate shut, and answers: "Sein Excellenz ist nich zu haus--!!!" Over the archway are the Royal Arms, the lion (burlesqued) and unicorn look down scandalized at the carriage, in which the Princess turns to Pergami who sits on her right, saying, "This Palace will lodge us well Sir Bergamot." Her plump breasts are displayed, and she wears a turban with a jewelled aigrette. Bergami wears hussar uniform with a furred dolman, and a bunch of orders hanging from his tunic. Facing the Princess sits little Willy Austin (see British Museum Satires No. 12027) wearing a round peaked cap; a lady wearing a tasselled cap like a smoking-cap sits next him. On the box are a foreign servant in quasi-military uniform and cockaded top-hat and a turbaned negro, with two big pistols in his sash. The negro puts his arm across the other's shoulders; both grin, as do two negro servants seated in the rumble with drawn swords; these also wear turbans, and are armed with pistols. Two postilions, French in type, flourish their whips; they wear huge jack-boots and large plumed cocked hats; the spirited horses have received a sudden check. The door-panel of the carriage, an open barouche is covered with the Royal Arms with the Prince's feathers. A stout peasant woman and a little boy (left) watch the cavalcade with astonishment; two dogs bark. Part of the Embassy forms a background: two rows of windows, the lower ones heavily barred."--British Museum online catalogue, description of an earlier state