"Below the title: '"Why who the Devil have we got here!! - It is only me Massa.' A man starts up in bed clutching the bed-curtain, staring round in horror at a black woman beside him, who grins at him, her right. hand on his right. shoulder. Her appearance, with white eyeballs and gleaming teeth, is sinister, and the man's hair rises through his night-cap."--British Museum online catalogue
Description:
Title from item., Caption below title: Why "who the devil have we got here." It is only me Massa., and Watermark: C. Ansell 1824.
A man looks up in horror at the image of a demon, smoking a pipe and holding a lantern, sitting astride his sleeping wife beside him in their truckle bed. A horse looks on, his head poking through the casement window. Beside their bed is a candle, chamber pot, and a chair on which he has thrown his coat. Probably deriving (remotely) from Fuseli's 'Nightmare'.
Alternative Title:
Nightmare
Description:
Title etched below image., Sheet trimmed to plate mark at top and bottom., and Matted to 41 x 55 cm.
Publisher:
Pub. by W. Holland, October 26, 1794, No. 50 Oxford Steet [sic]
"Napoleon, pushing an officer before him through a pillared doorway, looks back to speak to a monk and a sansculotte, shackled together, who drag a car in which is an imperial crown. They hold a large scroll inscribed: 'Most religious Sovereign - the benefactor of the church - the patron of liberty - the scourge of tyrants, and the defender of our most holy religion; may you long fill the Imperial Chair, and diffuse over a free and happy people all the blessings of your auspicious government.' Demons fly round a tricolour flag which floats from the car. Napoleon holds out a scroll headed: 'Address, &c. &c. &c. The Legions of France congratu - ', saying, "This token of your gratitude, my dear subjects will ever stimulate me to protect your liberties - to promote your happiness - and to preserve my empire from the ravages of war, tyranny and oppression." The officer, with a cynical smile, says: "Patron of Liberty - Defender of our most holy Religion - free and happy People - Ha! ha! ha! - What may we not expect? - Has he not got them under excellent subjection?" On the left is Napoleon's 'Secret Chamber': a table is covered with maps and plans; a large map, partly unrolled, shows Europe from '[En]gland to [Tur]key', including the 'Black Sea'; another map shows 'Suez' and the 'Red Sea'. A demon under the table holds up a large pile of papers: 'Plans against England'; on the floor are similar piles: 'Religion' and 'Treaties'. There are also 'Plans against Germany and Turkey', and a paper: 'Mem. the chance of the conquest of England is worth the sacrifice of one third of the people of France. Item. As Charlemaine not only conquered Italy, but the whole of Germany, and left the Imperial dignity hereditary in the Sovereigns of France, it is indispensably necessary to obtain possession of Germany, in order to support the dignity of the Gallic empire.' On the wall are three pictures: 'Sacking of Rome', 'Dissolution of the National Assembly' [see British Museum Satires No. 9426, &c], and 'View of Cairo' [see British Museum Satires No. 9358, &c.]. Below the design: 'Explanation. The two figures bringing the Imperial crown . . . represent . . . the bitter Enemies of Aristocracy, and the staunch Supporters of the late Monarchial Government, tackled to the National Machine, and reduced to the most abject State of Slavery by the Influence of the Military, whose congratulatory Address Bonaparte has received at the Hand of an Officer, and is introducing him into his Secret Chamber to receive Instructions. The Demons hovering over the Imperial Crown denote Five Years of Destruction; during which Period Bonaparte will overrun and ravage the greater Part of the Continent of Europe, be the Means of nearly depopulating Turkey, and finally be slain with the Sword, be cast out as an abominable Branch, and be left as Dung to rot on the Face of the Earth."--British Museum online catalogue
Description:
Title printed in letterpress above image., Text above imprint statement: For particulars respecting the ingress, progress and regress of the Gallic Empire, as represented in prophecy, see the publications entitled "The Prophetic Mirror," and "The Emperor of the Gauls," by L. Mayer; to be had at Parson's Library, Ludgate-Hill; and T. Williams, Stationers'-Court., Print was apparently sold separately, but also used as a folding plate in: Mayer, L. The prophetic mirror, or, A hint to England. London : Printed by C. Stower and sold by T. Williams, 1804., and "Price 1s. coloured."--Following imprint.
Publisher:
Published by L. Mayer, as the act directs and Bryer, printer, Bridge Street, Blackfriars
Subject (Name):
Napoleon I, Emperor of the French, 1769-1821
Subject (Topic):
Military officers, French, Monks, Flags, Ethnic stereotypes, Shackles, Crowns, Columns, Demons, and Maps
Alecto, a fantastic hag, stands outside the Crown and Anchor tavern between a diminutive Sheridan (left), playing a fife, and Fox (right), a burly drummer, both wearing regimentals. She towers above them, holding a long pike surmounted by a cap of 'Liberty' and holding out to John Bull, a yokel, a handful of 'Assignats'. Hissing serpents form her hair and serpents suck at the pendent breasts which her ragged garments do not cover. She has webbed wings, and wears a French cocked hat with a tricolour cockade inscribed 'Liberty'. She says: "Come on my brave Lad, take this bounty-money, & enter into my Company of Gentlemen Volunteers enlisted in the cause of Liberty - I'll find you present pay and free quarters, & I'll lead you where you shall fill your knapsack with Plunder; - nay Man, never talk about your old Master the Farmer, I'll find you Hundreds of Masters as good as he; Zounds I'll make you one of the Masters of England yourself: - come on, I say, keres riches for you, - come on; the glorious 14th of July is approaching, when Monarchs are to be crush'd like maggots, & brave men like yourself are to be put in their places - here hold your hand, enter boldly in the cause of Freedom, & cry Huzza - Vive la Nation! Huzza". John Bull stands on the left, scratching his head with a puzzled grin; he wears a smock and very wrinkled gaiters; his hat and a pitchfork are in his left hand. He answers: "Wounds, Measter Sarjeant, an I should enter into your sarvice, what'll Varmer-George say to I, for leaving of 'en without warning? - and yet I is half in love with the sound of your drum; & wishes to leave off Ploughing & dunging, & wear one of your vine cockades, & be a French Gentleman; - & yet, dangs it, it goes against ones heart to leave the Varmer; - ah Varmer George has been a rare good Measter to I! - but, am I to have all them fine paper Moneys - but to leave my old Measter! Ah me! I dozes'nt know what to do, not I!" -- British Museum catalogue
Alternative Title:
Recruiting sarjeant enlisting John Bull into the Revolution's Service, Alecto and her train at the gate of pandaemonium, and Alecto and her train at the gate of pandaemonuim, or, The recruiting sarjeant enlisting John Bull into the Revolution Service
Description:
Title inscribed in brown ink below image., 'Imprint statement' inscribed in brown ink above title: Pub. July 4th, 1791 by S.W. Fores, N. 3 Piccadilly., Description of published Gillray print in Catalogue of prints and drawings in the British Museum. Division I, political and personal satires, v. 6, no. 7889., Wright, T. Description of published Gillray print in Works of James Gillray, the caricaturist with the history of his life and times, p. 130., Wright, T. Description of published Gillray print in Historical and descriptive account of the caricatures by James Gillray, no. 56., and A 'counterprint' or transfer in brown ink from another print on verso of mount: The hopes of the party prior to July 14th.
Subject (Name):
Stanhope, Charles Stanhope, Earl, 1753-1816, George III, King of Great Britain, 1738-1820, Pitt, William, 1759-1806, Fox, Charles James, 1749-1806, Sheridan, Richard Brinsley, 1751-1816, and Revolution Society (London, England)
Subject (Topic):
John Bull (Symbolic character), Drums (Musical instruments), Demons, Witches, and Fire
Plate from the 'Anti-Jacobin Review', ii. 233: On the extreme right the Devil holds up a canvas, 'le Tableau Parlant', which terrifies twelve Irishmen grouped round an oblong table. In their alarm the heavy table has been overturned, some are on the ground, others (left) flee in terror. The Devil, who looks round the edge of his picture, wears a bonnet-rouge inscribed 'Anarchy'; labels hang from his horn: 'Blasph[emy]' and 'Parracide'. He says "Stew it well - It cannot be Overdone for you and me". In the picture, 'Irish Stew I A Favourite Disk for French Palates', two French soldiers superintend the boiling of a Revolutionary Pot, in which stand three naked Irishmen shrieking for mercy; one says: "Liberty of being Stewed"; the other, "Equality - all to be stewed en Masse". Above the table five harpies fly off with a tattered cloth inscribed 'Map of Ireland'. They are intended for the Directors, three having belts inscribed 'Tallien' (not a Director), 'Barras', and 'Le Paux'. On the table is a paper, 'United Irishmen'. The Irishmen make gestures of terror or despair. Most look at the picture, one looks upwards, saying: "Poor Erin How thourt torn to pieces by these five Harpies." A fugitive looks round to say "What your own A. O Connor too!" A lawyer (? Curran): "So much for Republicani[sm] and glorious Independence! No Money! No Lawyer." A monk: "By St Patrick a complete Catholic Emancipation." Three others say: "I now howl in Vain - We are all gone to Pot"; "Brother John [Bull] would not have treated us so -" ; "My Merits with the Republic should have saved me, but I find we must all stew together" [he is perhaps Grattan]; "A Radical Reform by Jasus". Beside the last speaker, a ragged peasant, lies a bundle of pikes, &c.
Description:
Title etched below image., Printmaker from British Museum catalogue., Sheet trimmed within plate mark., Plate from: The Anti-Jacobin review and magazine. London, 1799, v. 2, page 233, Temporary local subject terms: United Irishmen -- Maps: map of Ireland torn by demons -- Reference to the French Revolution -- Allusion to the Directory -- Allusion to anarchy -- Pictures: le tableau parlant., and Mounted to 31 x 37 cm.
Publisher:
Pubd. March 1st, 1799, by T. Whittle, Peterborough Court, Fleet Street, for the Anti Jacobin Review
Subject (Name):
Barras, Paul, vicomte de, 1755-1829 and Tallien, Jean-Lambert, 1767-1820
Title etched below image., Date supplied by curator., From an edition of "Het Groote Tafereel der Dwaasheid" or "The Great Mirror of Folly"., Below image are twenty-four lines of verse in Dutch., and This electronic record is derived from historic data and may not reflect our current information. Review and updating of records is ongoing.
Publisher:
publisher not identified
Subject (Geographic):
Great Britain
Subject (Topic):
South Sea Bubble, Great Britain, 1720, Politics and government, Globes, Cradles, Dissections, Monkeys, Demons, and Dead persons
"The King and Queen (left), seated under a canopy decorated with a crown and the royal arms, listen enraptured to a concert; the performers are arranged in a pyramid on the right. Numbers on the figures refer to notes engraved beneath the design. George III leans back, his hands clasped, eyes turned ecstatically upwards; he wears a laurel wreath and his head is surrounded by a star-shaped halo. The Queen sits upright with an eager expression, beating time; her hair and scraggy neck are covered with jewels (cf. BMSat 6978, &c). On the extreme left, and on the King's right, stands Pitt, very erect, a rattle in his right hand, blowing a whistle attached to a child's coral and bells. Behind the Queen are two ladies: '4', lean and ugly, holds an ear-trumpet to her ear; ['5'], who is stout, holds a parakeet on her finger. This group is: '1 Mr P------t'. '2 K------'. '3 Q------'. '4 Mad. Schw---gh--n' [Schwellenberg]. '5 Miss Jeff-----s' [Elizabeth Jefferyes or Jeffries, a Maid of Honour]. The royal party are on a circular carpet. On the roof of the canopy sits a demon holding up a purse in each hand, emblem of the supposed avarice of the King and Queen, a favourite subject with Gillray, cf. BMSat 7166, and see BMSat 7836, &c. Three demon hounds, inscribed 'G. R. Windsor', chase a realistically drawn fox (Fox), to whose tail is tied (by a ribbon inscribed 'Coalition') a pot with the features of North. The performers are arranged behind a low semicircular barrier. A stout man with a goat's head is asleep on the left, his hands clasped on his breast; from his pocket protrudes a paper inscribed 'Road to Wynnstay' (cf. BMSat 7068, &c). He is '6 Sr W. W. W-----ne' [Williams-Wynn], one of the founders of 'The Concert of Antient Music'. A demon child and an infant with butterfly-wings sit together on the barrier, singing from one book. A braying ass holding a book is '7 Mr Assb-----ge' (Ashbridge, a celebrated kettle-drummer). A bird of prey (? an owl) wearing a large cap stands on the barrier, a piece of music under its claws inscribed 'Anointed Solomon, King over all, E------'. She is '8 Mad. Mara.' Next '7' is seated a large ox supporting a music-book on his hoofs. He is 'J------h B--tes' (Joah Bates, originator (1776) and conductor of 'The Concert of Antient Music'). In the second row of performers (right to left) is a group (behind '7' and '8') of three fishwives: '10, D------ R------d'. the Duke of Richmond, with a basket of fish on his head, arms akimbo, is scolding '11, M-----s La--sd--e' (Marquis Lansdowne), while '12, Col. B--r-' (Barré), his eyes closed, joins in the dispute. An allusion to the altercation in the House of Lords over Richmond's proposed fortifications (see BMSat 7149 etc.). Next, realistically drawn, is '13 Sir J. M--why' (Mawbey), holding under his arm a squeaking pig whose tail he is twisting as if it were a musical instrument. Mawbey, as a distiller, was famous for keeping large quantities of hogs, see BMSats 5746, 7506, &c. Two lawyers sing from the same music; they are '14 Atty Genl' (Arden) and '15 Sollr Genl' (Macdonald). Behind their heads, and towards the apex of the pyramid, stand two judges facing each other, each holding a chimney-sweep's shovel and brush which they strike together in the manner of chimney-sweeps on May Day. They are '16. D--n--as' (Dundas) and '17. Ld L--ghb--gh' (Loughborough). The former's shovel is decorated with a thistle, the latter's with a man hanging from a gibbet, with the date '1745' and 'Kenn Com' in allusion to the Jacobites executed on Kennington Common, one of whom was Sir John Wedderburn. The apex of the pyramid is '18. Ch--n--ll--r', Thurlow, standing with a fierce expression; he holds up a pair of birch-rods above the bare posteriors of two terrified boys who serve as kettle-drums. Two squalling and fighting cats hang from the ceiling by ribbons attached to their tails. Beneath the design is engraved: '------Monarchs, who with Rapture wild, Hear their own Praise with Mouths of gaping Wonder, And control each Crotchet of the Birth-day Thunder. Peter Pindar.' The satire illustrates this and other passages from 'Ode upon Ode', which attack Pitt for obsequiousness to the King, and the King and Queen for their parsimony in attending the Concerts of Antient Music as subscribers instead of having concerts at their palace: '- Monarchs, who with oeconomic Fury Force all the tuneful World to Tot'n'am Lane.' Mawbey is mentioned: 'Strains! that Sir Joseph Mawbey deem'd divine, Sweet as the Quavers of his fattest Swine.' Wynn also: 'The sleek Welsh Deity who Music knows- The Alexander of the Tot'n'am Troops.' Richmond is mentioned: 'Mad as his Military Grace For fortifying ev'ry Place . . .' The cats: 'How like the Notes of Cats, a vocal Pair.'"--British Museum online catalogue
Description:
Title from item., Printmaker from British Museum catalogue., Later state, with numbers and explanatory notes, hairs on the queen's face and further stippling on the king's face., Publication date inferred from watermark., Sheet trimmed within plate mark., Temporary local subject terms: Allusion to Sir John Wedderburn, 1704-1746? -- Chimney sweep's implements -- Singing lawyers -- Squeking pigs -- Fighting cats -- Dispute over Richmond's fortifications -- Child demons -- Ribbon of coalition -- Circular carpets -- Royal canopies -- Demon hounds -- Royal parsimony -- Birds: paraket -- Owls -- Kensington Common -- Literature: allusion to Peter Pindar's Ode upon ode -- Concerts: Antient music, 1787 -- Music: Serenata 'Solomon' by William Boyce -- Emblems -- Allusion to Jacobites -- Children: bous a kettle drums -- Richmond as a fishwoman -- Music books -- Performers in pyramid shape -- Star-shaped haloes -- Birch rods -- Toys: coral and bells -- Cherubs., Watermark: R A 1801 on the left side of sheet; fleur-de-lis on the right side., Matted to 56 x 71 cm., and Verso of former mount (49 x 60 cm), now laid in, with image in reverse of La belle assemblee.
Publisher:
Pub'd May 10th, 1787 by S.W. Fores, Piccadilly
Subject (Name):
George III, King of Great Britain, 1738-1820, Charlotte, consort of George III, King of Great Britain, 1744-1818, Pitt, William, 1759-1806, Fox, Charles James, 1749-1806, North, Frederick, Lord, 1732-1792, Williams-Wynn, Watkin, Sir, 1749-1789, Mara, Gertrud Elisabeth, 1749-1833, Richmond, Charles Lennox, 3d Duke of, 1735-1806, Lansdowne, William Petty, Marquis of, 1737-1805, Mawbey, Joseph, Sir, 1730-1798, Alvanley, Richard Pepper Arden, Baron, 1745-1804, Macdonald, Archibald, Sir, 1747-1826, Melville, Henry Dundas, Viscount, 1742-1811, Rosslyn, Alexander Wedderburn, Earl of, 1733-1805, Thurlow, Edward Thurlow, Baron, 1731-1806, Schwellenberg, Elizabeth Juliana, ca 1728-1797, Jefferyes, Elizabeth, active 1787-1791, Ashbridge, John, -1799, Bates, Joah, 1741-1799, and Barré, Isaac, 1726-1802
Title from caption below image., Print signed using William Heath's device: A man with an umbrella., Questionable date of publication from British Museum catalogue., Temporary local subject terms: Clubs -- Crockford's Gaming House -- Sharks -- John Bull -- Male costume: Gaiters -- Walking-sticks., and Numbered in ms. at top of sheet: 90.
