In a French brothel, an obese old man sits lounges in an armchair with a large eyeglass in his hand; the matron of the establishment stands at his side gesturing to the four young women are parade through the door, showing off their figures as they enter. A bag of coins lay on the floor by his side. A canopied bed can just be seen on the edge of the scene on the far right
A print showing the front elevation of a brothel, with a sign over the door “Young Ladies Educated & Board.” At the threshold of the establishment, the brothel keeper (possibly Charlotte Hayes) stands at the front door talking with a young man who holds a riding crop (possibly her common-law husband, Dennis O’Kelly.) The two windows on the ground floor show, on the left, a woman entertaining a portly gentleman, and, on the right, two pretty, young woman, one leaning out the window to view the scene at the door. In the two windows on the upper, left and center, two other women are already entertaining men (one of whom is a clergyman) while on the right, two pretty women look down at the scene on the brothel threshold. On the left, a man reads handbills in a covered alley identified as “Kings Place.” On the sidewalk (left) a pedestrian holds a monocle to his eye to better see the women; in his pocket is a paper with a title “Economical Lowe[r?]. On the sidewalk to the right, a flower girl in ragged clothes holds out a bunch of flowers to the young man addressing the madam. A woman (dwarf) crier holds a sheet titled “The Harlot’s Progress.”
Title: The onlytruelist, of thosecelebratedsportingladies, or petticoat amblers, who afford the bucks and bloods an amorous felicity every evening during the races.
Publication: [Lichfield, England?] : [publisher not identified], [ca. 1780]
Print with twelve panels relating to the affair of Mary Toft, “the rabbit breeder”: from top left, she is held aloft by two men and a Harlequin or Merry Andrew, she has a rabbit in either hand; she pursues a rabbit while working in a field; she dreams of being impregnated by rabbit, Cupid is shown on a cloud beside her bed holding a rabbit in either hand; she is seated in a chair attended by two women while the two men and Harlequin discuss the monstrous birth; Harlequin demonstrates that he can express milk from her breast; Harlequin feels “the rabbets leapin in her belly” while two men look on; she sits on the edge of a bed and Harlequin kneels to seize a rabbit that emerges from her skirts while a doctor raises his hands in surprise, wishing to anatomize the animal; Harlequin stands behind a table holding a balance in which he weighs dung removed from the rabbit explaining to two men that this will allow him to judge whether the animal had “breath’d in air”; doctors and midwives discuss the phenomenon around a table and Harlequin enters claiming that the birth must be “praeternatural”; a crowd of gentlemen are welcomed to the bagnio in Leicester Square where Toft is housed; two men spy from the door to Toft’s room as another hands her a dead rabbit; Toft, weeping, is led away to Bridewell by two constables while Harlequin “sits upon Repenting stool, Cursing his fate in being made a Fool. See British Museum online catalogue.
Title: The doctors in labour, or, A new whim wham from Guildford [graphic] : being a representation of [the] frauds by which [the] Godliman woman, carried on her pretended rabbit breeding; also of [the] simplicity of our doctors, by which they assisted to carry on that imposture discover’d their own skill, & contributed to [the] Mirth, of His Majesties liege subjects.
Published: [London?] : [publisher not identified], [1726]
“A decrepit old man stands at the door of a house of ill fame at the corner of Portland Street; Mrs Burke is on the door-plate. One hand is on the knocker; he turns to scowl at a woman (right) who holds out a bunch of water-cress from a large shallow basket slung from the hip. A child clings to her shoulders; a little girl (left) with a small basket also offers him a bunch. Two young courtesans lean from a first-floor window. In the background (right), behind a spiked gate, are trees and a large house (or houses).”–British Museum online catalogue.
Printmaker: Merke, Henri, printmaker.
Title: Water cresses, come buy my water cresses [graphic] / Rowlandson delin. ; Merke sculp.
Publication: London : Pub. Mar. 1, 1799, at R. Ackermann’s, 101 Strand, [1 March 1799]
