Plan your visit. 225 Madison Avenue at 36th Street, New York, NY 10016.

Plan your visit. 225 Madison Avenue at 36th Street, New York, NY 10016.

The general election / W.D.

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William Dent
active 1783-1793

The general election / W.D.

Published

[London] : Pubd as the act directs by J. Brown, Rathbone Place, April 7, 1784.

etching & drypoint
image: 311 x 243 mm; plate mark: 351 x 250 mm; sheet: 334 x 243 mm
Peel 3272
Notes
TItle from item.
W.D. is the monogram: William Dent.
Library's copy trimmed within plate mark.
Provenance

Formerly owned by Sir Robert Peel.

Summary

The disproportionately large heads in wigs of, from left, Lord North, Charles Fox, and Edmund Burke, are displayed on top of Temple Bar. The arch contains reversed and burlesqued royal arms. In three niches below the arch stand headless statues of, from left, North as Avarice, Fox, shown as a fox, as Ambition, and Burke as Hypocrisy. The declaration signed by 'Justice' and pasted to the gate in the archway explains the reasons for elevating the three Whigs so highly, in a manner reminiscent of the execution of the Jacobite leaders in 1746. On the left are pasted two playbills. The upper one refers to the King's candidates in the Westminster election, the lower one to Fox as Cromwell, North as Boreas, and Burke as St. Omer, a 7th-century bishop who became blind in his old age. On the opposite side of the archway, an advertisement by 'Dr. Ax' is followed by a plea for votes from Cerberus whose three heads are named after North, Burke, and Fox.

Associated names
Brown, J., publisher.
Peel, Robert, 1788-1850, former owner.
Classification
Department
Century prints