The magnanimous-minister chastising Prussian-perfidy [graphic] / Js. Gillray fect.

[London] : Pubd. May 2d, 1806, by H. Humphrey, 27 St. James's Street, London, [2 May 1806]

1 print : etching ; plate mark 24.6 x 35 cm, on sheet 27.2 x 39 cm

wove paper

From a collection in twelve volumes probably compiled by Francis Harvey and sold at auction, Sotheby, London, June 1900. Bequest of Hugh Dudley Auchincloss to Yale University Library, 1981. Bound by Riviere & Son in three-quarters red morocco with gold tooling and gold lettering on spine.

"Fox, wearing a military cocked hat, with civilian dress, threatens Prussia (or Frederick William III) with his sabre, while he puts a foot on the sword that Prussia has dropped. The latter, a grotesque figure with a long pigtail and moustaches, kneels terrified at his feet, clasping his hands in supplication. His Death's Head Hussar cap falls from his thrown-back head; he wears a fur-trimmed cloak and tunic, with a badge of the Prussian Eagle on his sleeve, with half-boots and extravagant spurs. Fox says, with an expression of sour and calculating contempt, " - O you Prussian Marauder, you! - what I've caught you at last? - what, You took me for a double-faced-Talleyrand! did you? - did you think I was like yourself, to Look One way & Row another? - what you thought because I make Loyal Speeches now, that I must be a Turncoat? - O you Frenchified Villain! - I'll teach you to humbug & insult my poor, dear, dear Master? - & to join with such Rascals as Boney, & O'Conner!" Prussia exclaims, terrified, "indeed! indeed! indeed! I could not help it. - " Meanwhile, Napoleon, holding his sabre, and wearing feathered bicorne, with spurred jack-boots, furtively hastens up to Fox from behind, to read the open book which the latter displays to him behind his back: 'State of the Nation'."--British Museum online catalogue.

English

June 04, 2015