"Frontispiece to forty-nine (coloured) plates, see British Museum Satires nos. 10816-63. The title, &c., is engraved on a framed tablet supported on a stone base in front of which are figures. An aged miser, moribund and toothless, seated in an armchair which is also a commode, is violently jolted by Death (left), a skeleton, who seizes the chair and tilts it backwards. The man has swathed gouty legs and holds a crutch; he wears a nightcap and dressing gown. Death has dropped his hour-glass. The old man looks with impotent anger at his young wife and her lover (right) who with defiant exultation pillage his 'Strong Box'. She has taken out money-bags, and holds up to him one inscribed 'Pin Money'; her foot rests on a 'Post Obit'. The young man is behind her, running forward, and holding up a bag of 'Pocket Pieces' whose contents he scatters. Beside him on the ground are a paper: 'Sale of Timber', and a book: 'Turf Callender - Cock Fighting'. Above the tablet are swags of leaves supported by a tragic and a comic mask. From the ends are suspended (left) a tambourine, (right) pan-pipes."--British Museum online catalogue.
Description:
Printmaker from the British Museum online catalogue., Title etched within image., and Title page to: Rowlandson, T. Miseries of human life. [London] : Published December 14, 1808, by R. Ackermann ..., [1808].
Publisher:
R. Ackermann, Repository of the Arts, 101 Strand
Subject (Name):
Ackermann, Rudolph, 1764-1834, publisher., Auchincloss, Hugh Dudley--Ownership., and Harvey, Francis--Ownership.
"Many heads, grotesque and otherwise, are grouped round an oval space ... . The figures along the lower margin are half length, and look upwards. Some seem to be characters in a masquerade. They include (above): an ugly old parson preaching (the centre figure), flanked by a doctor sniffing a medicine-bottle, and a lawyer shouting from his 'Brief'. Above him is the head and arm of a soldier, in violent action, and with a skull (Death) grinning at his unconscious profile. There are also (inter multa alia) a pretty young woman with an infant, a grossly drink-blotched monk holding a bottle, a devil clasping a young woman wearing a small mask across her eyes, a witch with a broom, a Chinese, a Turk. ... This title-page is not used in either of two sets of the [Caricature] magazine inspected."--British Museum online catalogue, description of a proof state.
Alternative Title:
Mirror of mirth
Description:
Attributed to Rowlandson by Grego., Date from Grego; the British Museum catalogue suggests a date of 1809., For a proof state before letters, see no. 11458 in the Catalogue of prints and drawings in the British Museum. Division I, political and personal satires, v. 8., Probably a title page to: Woodward, G.M. Caricature magazine, or Hudibrastic mirror. London : Thomas Tegg, [1808?]., and Title from text in image.
Publisher:
Thos. Tegg, No. 111 Cheapside
Subject (Name):
Auchincloss, Hugh Dudley--Ownership., Harvey, Francis--Ownership., and Tegg, Thomas, 1776-1845, publisher.