Four caricatures of men eating soup each type identified below the image: a rich man with rhinophyma eats “Turtle Soup”; a tall, thin soldier with a queue hairstyle eats “Soup Maigre”; a dustman eats “Pea Soup”; and a thin man in an upholstered armchair and wearing a cap and slippers eats “Mutton Broth.”
- Printmaker: Heath, Henry, active 1824-1850, printmaker.
- Title: Turtle soup. Soup maigre. Pea soup. Mutton broth [graphic].
- Publication: [London] : [William Cole], [1826?]
826.00.00.93
Acquired September 2023
A group of gentlemen seated at an oval table, with glasses full of wine, laugh uproariously at a joke as they look down at the dog at the foot of the table.
A tailor and cobbler, both are partially bald, are seated with their backs to roaring fire in the grate of a fireplace. The cobbler is sitting at a table with a glass and tankard in front of him; he is smoking a pipe and blowing the smoke into the tailor’s face. The tailor sits slumped forward in a state of evident inebriation and his own pipe lies broken on the floor. On the wall behind them is a picture of a man seated under a tree sketching(?) the rural scene in front of him, a church with a steeple in the distance.
“Popular print, satire, after print published by Laurie & Whittle in 1794 (British Museum satires no. 8596): five men sit at a small square table on which are glasses and an empty punch-bowl, all have expressions of deep melancholy: one reverses his glass, another breaks his pipe, the bowl of which still smokes, the third weeps, the fourth looks down with a gesture of deprecating misery, the fifth looking towards the viewer.”–British Museum online catalogue.
“Elderly men sit and stand, all smoking long pipes; large clouds of smoke issue from their mouths, but little or nothing comes from the bowls of their pipes. Most sit or stand silently morose; two standing men (left) appear to be puffing smoke in each other’s faces. One leans back, apparently asleep, but smoking. An ugly man seated on the extreme right takes the hand of a pretty young woman who stands opposite him; he holds a large key. She slips a note into the hand of a fierce-looking military officer who stands with his back to her. On the wall (right) is a placard: ‘At a general meeting of this Society, it was resolv’d by a Majority of Independent members, that any member may be Indulg’d with having the Key brought him, by his Servant or hand-maid, but on no pretence whatever be followd by that bane of good fellowship calld the White Sergeant.’ Above the door are framed Rules: ‘Ist No Gemman to be a member of this Society who cannot smoke three pipes at one sitting – NB no Spitting 2d No members pipe to be more than 14 Inches nor less than nine unless permitted so to do by the Landlady 3d Every member to find his own Stopper 4th Any member who puffs designedly in the face of another, to be find sixpence or be puff’d at in return by the whole company 5th All fines to be spent in Porter T. Twig Secy’ On the back wall is a large print of Sir Walter Raleigh seated smoking (right) while a servant raises a bucket to fling at the smoke.”–British Museum online catalogue.
“Rural scene with two couples dancing on the left while a man pipes and plays a drum under a tree on the right, and another couple watch at a table in front of him, smoking and drinking; village in the background.”–British Museum online catalogue.