How to avoid the horse duty [graphic]Nixon, John, -1818, printmaker[1 January 1791]eng"A stout farmer rides (left to right) past an inn on a cow. The cow befouls and tramples on a paper inscribed 'Tax on Ho[rses]'. The farmer looks triumphantly over his right shoulder at a group of spectators standing at the door of the inn, and snaps his fingers, saying, "Pitt be D------d". A basket containing poultry hangs from the saddle. Part of the inn is on the left of the design, its sign is a stout man holding a foaming tankard gazing at three sacks, inscribed 'Joe Jolly 1784' (a '7' appears to have been etched over the '4'). Five amused spectators stand by the door; from a window above two men applaud the farmer."--British Museum online catalogueTitle etched below image.Reissue of a print originally published in 1784.Pitt's budget of 1784 imposed an annual tax of 10s. on saddle- and carriage-horses, exempting those used for trade and agriculture. On 27 November 1784 one Jonathan Thatcher rode his cow to and from the market of Stockport in protest against the horse-tax. See Chambers, 'Book of Days', ii. 627, where there is a copy of a similar print.For a variant state, see no. 6672 in the Catalogue of prints and drawings in the British Museum. Division I, political and personal satires, v. 6.