Beggar's Opera, Act III as originally perform'd at Lincoln's Inn Fields, 1727. [graphic][1 July 1790]engTheatrical scene in a prison, after Hogarth's painting illustrating Gay's "The Beggar's Opera". Audience members are shown seated in boxes to the left and right; in the centre, the character of Macheath, a highwayman, stands in shackles; on either side of him, his wife and lover are kneeling before their respective fathers, pleading for intervention on Macheath's behalf; in the background, a group of male figures (Macheath's gang?). Each figure is numbered and listed below under the appropriate category -- performers or audienceTitle etched above image.Sheet trimmed to plate mark on top edge.Key plate to the painting by Hogarth and the engraving after it by William Blake.Mounted on page 162 of Horace Walpole's extra-illustrated copy of his: A description of the villa of Mr. Horace Walpole. Strawberry Hill : Printed by Thomas Kirgate, 1784. See Hazen, A.T. Bibliography of the Strawberry Hill Press (1973 ed.), no. 30, copy 12.1 print : etching on wove paper ; sheet 14.6 x 22 cm.Sheet trimmed within plate mark.Annotated by Horace Walpole in pencil in lower right corner: Some of the figures in the boxes are different from those in Mr. Walpole's picture.