11.
- Creator:
- Gillray, James, 1756-1815, printmaker
- Published / Created:
- [6 October 1803]
- Call Number:
- Auchincloss Gillray v. 5
- Image Count:
- 1
- Resource Type:
- still image
- Abstract:
- "The Devil, seated with his back to a dinner-table made of a butcher's block, roasts Napoleon on a pitchfork in the flames of Hell; excrement falls into a dish below. Attendant demons act as cooks. The Devil is obese and hairy with barbed tail, webbed wings, and carbuncled nose emitting flames. He wears a bonnet rouge in the form of a fool's cap, with tricolour cockade and scarf. The back of his ornate chair is a guillotine; beneath it is a pile of skulls over which is a tricolour ribbon inscribed 'Robespiere Marat'. A tricolour table-cloth only partly hides the dripping butcher's block. On it are a carving-knife, the blade inscribed 'Taleyrand', and fork; a chalice inscribed 'Atheism' and 'Cup of French Faith'; a salt-cellar, the salt spilled, inscribed 'Sal Infernal'. Beside it stands an ornate wine-cooler inscribed 'Favourite French Wines of the Consular Vintage'; bottles are labelled 'Sang des Suisse[s]', 'Sang des Anglais', 'Sang des Holland[ais]'. Near it lies a ballad: 'Invasion of Great Britain a Catch to be performed after Supper with a full Chorus of his Highness's Band'. Two demon attendants on the extreme right., partly concealed by the r. margin, enter with a steaming tureen of 'Crocodile Soup' [see BMSat 11057] and a sauce-boat of 'Mahomedan Gravy.' A little wingless female demon sits on a sack of 'Fuel for Everlasting Flames', plying bellows. Papers pour from the sack and others are already burning: 'Poisoning 580 wounded French soldiers' [see BMSat 10063], 'Massacre of 3800 Turks at Jaffa' [see BMSat 10062], 'Murdering 1500 Women at Toulon' [see BMSat 10095, &c.], 'Assassination of captive Swiss', 'Destruction of St Domingo' [cf. BMSat 10090], 'Fire', 'Swo[rd]', 'extermination', 'Murder', 'Treachery', 'Blasphemy', 'Blood', 'Breach of Faith', 'Cruelty', 'Envy', 'Perjury', 'Ingratitude', 'Devestation', 'Avarice'. There are three other demon cooks, winged, wearing bonnets rouges and aprons: each holds his nose. One flying above Bonaparte bastes him with a ladle-full of Brimstone. The others (l.) hold ready for the fire a pan of vipers and three skewered frogs. Across a vault up which the flames ascend is a beam inscribed 'L'Armée D'Angletarre' [sic] from which are suspended by the neck simian creatures wearing French military coats. Winged monsters dart towards Napoleon. Below the title, in two columns, verses are etched, attributed ('Illustrative Description', 1830) to Paul Sandby. ... The verses are coarse invective and contain none of the detailed allegation of the print."--British Museum online catalogue
- Alternative Title:
- Belzebub going to supper
- Description:
- Title etched below image., Eight stanzas of verse in two columns below title: Buonapartè they say, aye good lack a day! With French legions will come hither swimming ..., and Mounted on leaf 67 of volume 5 of 12.
- Publisher:
- Publish'd Octr. 6th, 1803, by H. Humphrey, No. 27 St. James's Street, London
- Subject (Name):
- Napoleon I, Emperor of the French, 1769-1821
- Found in:
- Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library > The Corsican-pest, or, Belzebub going to supper [graphic]