Three Cossacks on horseback pretend to flee from French soldiers. See British Museum online catalogue
813.00.00.26
Acquired June 2024
“Burdett (right) and Brougham (left) as chairmen, carry (left to right) a bottomless sedan-chair enclosing O’Connell, who is forced to walk rapidly, looking from the window towards Brougham to say ‘Mighty like a walk this after all’. He wears barrister’s wig and gown. The chair is surmounted by shamrock and is inscribed ‘M.P.’ The chairmen wear livery coats; Burdett is bareheaded, and wears his usual top-boots and breeches; Brougham wears barrister’s wig and bands with a battered hat.”–British Museum online catalogue.
829.05.00.12+
Acquired June 2024
Benjamin Holbrook, shown full-length in profile, walking to the left, holding with a long white staff in his right hand, clutching two memorandum books in his left hand, heading towards Fleet Market, with the west front of St. Paul’s Cathedral visible in the background. His eyes being closed and the presence of the staff indicate his blindness, and the patched elbow of his three-quarter-length coat his poverty.
Drawings N736 no. 11 Box D141
Acquired May 2024
Watercolor drawing of a grotesque old woman, with lines from Thomas Cambell’s poem “Pleasures of Hope” (1799) written in ink below: The world was sad, The garden was a wild, And man the hermit sigh’d ’till woman smil’d.
On the verso a cropped impression of Plate 21, from the Miseries of London, captioned with a letterpress text cut from the work: See BMSat 10865: At the corner of Chancery Lane a fashionably dressed man and a scavenger have collided violently: both register pain and anger. Hackney coachmen on a stand facing the end of the street watch with amusement. A man behind (left) chases his hat, 1 March 1807.
Drawings Un58 no. 99 Box D166
Acquired September 2023
Four employees of a hatter force their employer into a bath of black dye. One of the journeymen holds a beaver by its tail as it cries “He robbed me of my coat, and blam’d others for it.” A young apprentice entering from the right holds out a fish to the beaver. In the foreground a black demon whose speech balloon reads, “Push him through my lads. I’ll adopt him as one of my children.”
806.04.14.01+
Acquired April 2024
“The death of Chunee, a large Asian elephant, kept at the Exeter Change menagerie; to the left; a group of soldiers and others, all carrying guns; some observing and others firing on Chunee to the right; who, roaring, breaks the bars of his wooden cage; blood pouring from many wounds and soaking the floor; the keeper, in shirtsleeves, stabbing the elephant with a bayonet; smoke obscuring the scene; behind; small iron-barred cages containg an agitated lion and tiger respectively; above hutches containing monkeys, one grasping the bars.”–British Museum online catalogue.
826.03.06.01+
Acquired September 2023
“Two fighting-cocks, with the heads of Napoleon and Pitt, face each other across the English Channel. Napoleon (left) has a large ruff of tricolour feathers and enormously long spurs, but his wings and tail feathers are clipped. His cliff is the higher; he leans forward, saying, “Eh Master Billy, if I could but take a flight over this Brook I would soon stop your Crowing, I would Knock you off that Perch, I swear by Mahomet, the Pope and all the Idols I have ever Worshiped.” Pitt stands on a large royal crown which brings his feet almost to a level with those of Bonaparte; he stands erect, thus towering above his rival; he has very short spurs but a fine tail and wings; he crows: “Tuck a roo – too that you never can do!!!” Below them lies the sea with a fleet of ships in full sail close to the English coast.”–British Museum online catalogue.
803.03.27.01
Acquired November 2023
“George IV, crowned, and with orb and sceptre, sits on a coronation chair in Westminster Abbey (right). The Archbishop, well characterized, stands beside him, holding his mitre, his right hand on the chair. On the King’s right hand stands Londonderry (Castlereagh) in Garter robes; other peers stand behind him. All watch the antics of Canning, dressed in parti-coloured clothes as a merry-andrew or buffoon. He kneels on the dais at the King’s feet, arms flung wide; at his feet is a high-crowned hat with a peacock’s feather; on the back of his tunic are the letters M P and P C. He declaims: The delight of the Nation at the Celebration of your Majesty’s Coronation, the Exultation throughout the Creation exceeds all Imagination. the Expectation to which the Anticipation of this Consumation has given occasion is beyond Contemplation; we offer the Oblation of our Congratulation, without Hesitation or Trepidation; no Tribulation can effect a Cessation of the Sensation which pervades every Station; no Situation in whatever Deprivation will utter an Execration for the Association are in Preparation to effect an Extirpation of all Defamation. We hope the Expectation of a Decollation will produce Annihilation of all Deviation from strict Regulation; we submit to Subjugation without Hesitation, and we offer our Oration with gratefull Adoration upon this Jollification. The King composedly touches (or kicks) Canning’s chin with his toe. Peeresses stand in a gallery across the north transept, holding their coronets. Above them is a second and more crowded gallery.”–British Museum online catalogue.
821.07.00.04
Acquired September 2023
A clergyman in bands and gown, his hat on the pavement, squares up to a watchman holding a lantern and stick, his fists raised. He has evidently knocked out one watchman already, who lies on the ground, wig dislodged and still touching his lantern, while a third approaches from the left. Possibly from a series featuring a pugnacious parson’s brushes with the law.
778.09.14.01+
Acquired September 2023
A fashionable couple walk on a country road past a cottage. A woman carrying a small child and carrying bags on her back approach them from behind and one of her small children on foot doffs his cap and reaches out his hand for alms. Another small child, also cap in hand, hangs onto his mother’s skirts. Also on the road, heading in the opposite direction is a wagon filled with recruits and soldiers and one woman holding onto a large trunk.
812.00.00.130
Acquired September 2023