“Diogenes stands in the House of Commons between the two front benches; both arms are thrown out towards Burdett with a dramatic gesture; in one hand is his lantern, illuminating the patriot at close range; small clouds at his feet indicate that he is a ghost. He turns his head to look steadily at three members on the front Ministerial bench (left), saying: “An Honest Man is the noblest work of God” [Pope, ‘Essay on Man’, quoted by Burns, cf. British Museum Satires No. 11562]. The three culprits (unrecognizable) register shame and terror, their hair standing on end. Burdett stands by the front bench (right) on which is his hat, displaying to the frightened Ministers (one intended for Perceval) a document headed ‘Magna Charta–Pro Rege, lege, grege’ [see British Museum Satires No. 11547]. Except for one member on the front bench, those behind Burdett stand, five being depicted, three of whom wave their hats. All the occupants of the gallery wave still more emphatically. In the background and on the left is the Speaker’s Chair; the diminutive Abbot, author of the famous Warrant, see British Museum Satires No. 11545, &c., holds up a hand in astonished alarm. Burdett was in the Tower during May, see British Museum Satires No. 11558. ‘Hair on end’ is an allusion to Lethbridge, see British Museum Satires No. 11538.”–British Museum online catalogue.
- Printmaker: Williams, Charles, active 1797-1830, printmaker.
- Title: The triumph of truth, or, The ghost of Diogenes, more hair on end [graphic].
- Publication: [London] : Pubd. May 1810 by T. Tegg, 111 Cheapside, [May 1810]
810.05.00.01+
Acquired March 2021
A scene in a fashionable library with ladies and gentlemen conversing with attendants at the counters on either side. On the left a woman looks in a book while her male companion converses with a clergyman, as the woman behind the counter consults a book. On the right, a man sits in a chair as a lady discusses her choices with the man behind the counter who reaches for a book below a sign ‘Stamp’. Behind him is another sign “Just published […]” An older woman with a walking stick approaches the counter on the right, followed by a Black servant and a dog. The windows are filled with books and prints. Through the open door a woman with an umbrella is silhouetted; to the left another sign “History Westminster and its monuments.”
A copy in reverse of William Hogarth’s Plate 6 of A harlot’s progress: A dilapidated room with Moll Hackabout’s friends, mostly prostitutes, gathered around her open coffin, several of them weeping; one young woman stands with her back to the scene as she gazes at herself in the mirror. On the right, a clergyman spills his brandy as he surreptitiously gropes beneath a woman’s skirt; Moll’s serving woman, standing at the coffin with a wine bottle and glass in hand scowls at the pair. Under the window and to the left, the undertaker flirts with a pretty young prostitute who picks a handkerchief from his pocket. In the foreground Moll’s small son plays with a spinning top. Sprigs of yew (rosemary?) decorate her coffin; a plate of yew rests on the floor at the parson’s feet, another spring at her son’s feet.
A copy in reverse of William Hogarth’s Plate 5 of A harlot’s progress: In a squalid room Moll Hackabout, wrapped in a sheet, is dying while two doctors (Richard Rock and Jean Misaubin) argue over their remedies. Her serving-woman reaches out to them in alarm to get their attention for the invalid, while another woman rifles through Moll’s portmanteau (with her initials as in Plate 1). A small boy knelling next to Moll’s chair scratches his head as he turns a joint of meat roasting in front of the fire while a pot overflows on the grate. An over-turned table with an advertisement “Practical scheme … ‘Anodyne” litters the floor in the foreground.
Copy in reverse of the first state of Plate 3 of Hogarth’s ‘The Rake’s Progress’ (Paulson 134): A room at the Rose Tavern, Drury Lane (after the painting at Sir John Soane’s Museum); to left, Tom, surrounded by prostitutes and clearly drunk, sprawls on a chair with his foot on the table; one young woman embraces him and steals his watch, another spits a stream of gin across the table to the amusement of a young black woman standing in the background; one woman drinks from the punchbowl; another is removing her clothes in order to perform “postures”; to the right, a harpist and a door through which enters a man holding a large dish and a candle, and a pregnant ballad singer holding a sheet lettered “Black Joke”; on the walls hang a map of the world to which a young woman holds a candle and framed prints of Roman emperors, all (except that of Nero) damaged. A second version of the paintings is at the Atkins Museum (Kansas City, Missouri).
Copy in reverse of the first state of Plate 4 of Hogarth’s ‘The Rake’s Progress’ (Paulson 135): In this scene two baliffs, one with an arrest notice in his hand, have stopped Tom Rakewell’s sedan chair in St. James’s Street; Tom is presumably on his way to White’s gaming house which can be seen in the background. They are foiled in their attempt to arrest Tom for debt as Sarah Young, the young woman whom he had seduced and abandoned, offers the bailiffs her purse instead. Sarah is now a dealer in millinery as is suggested by the notions falling from her purse. In the right foreground a shoe-black apparently taking advantage of the situation to take hold of Tom’s elegant walking stick. Above them a careless lamplighter spills some oil on Tom’s head. To the left a Welshman, probably the creditor, honouring St David’s day (March 1st) with a leek in his hat, accompanied by his manicured dog, simply watches the scene. In the distance is the gate of St James’s Palace with a crowd of sedan-chairs approaching to celebrate the birthday of Queen Caroline.