French invasion upon Dutch bottoms ombres chinoises / [graphic]

"Five members of the Opposition watch with admiring surprise 'Ombres Chinoises': figures whose shadows are thrown on a sheet or screen, the scene enclosed in a circle: three fat Dutchmen seated on the sea advance directly towards the spectators. On the shoulders of each sits a French sansculotte soldier, cadaverous and sinister; the central figure wears a cocked hat from which project cannon or trench-mortars, he holds a tricolour flag. The others wear bonnets-rouges; one (left) blows a trumpet, the other (right) beats a drum. The Dutchmen are impassively smoking pipes, two wear French cockades; from the hips of each project the mouths of cannon. The light background of the circle stands out on a tinted ground; above it is a scroll, apparently issuing from the mouth of the trumpet: 'Terror the Order of the Day'. Only the heads and shoulders of the spectators are visible, all in back view except that of Lansdowne on the extreme right, who says "Astonishing effect". The others (left to right) are Fox, looking through a glass as in British Museum Satires No. 8641, Sheridan, Stanhope, and a bishop identified as Watson of Llandaff. Fox says: "what a fine Effect"."--British Museum online catalogue