The Humpback (La Male Bosse)

Cochin's counterproof was apparently pulled from a drawing preparatory for an illustration to the comte de Caylus's parody "Mémoires de l'Académie des colporteurs" (Paris, 1748). Caylus's volume, which he published anonymously, satirized the reports of the Royal Academy in the form of memoires from an academy of peddlers, or itinerant booksellers who often sold salacious or seditious printed material. An impression of the corresponding engraving, in the same direction as the counterproof, is also in the Morgan's collection and is mounted on the same mat (1986.29:2). The title refers to the peddler seen at right opening the door to soldiers as a seated young woman and her elderly companion share a drink.
The sheet was formerly in an album containing 102 drawings that were sold in thirty-four lots at Sotheby's, London, in 1970. Seguin's coat of arms appeared on the upper and lower covers of the red morocco binding of the volume.