print;
satirical print
- Museum number
- 1868,0808.8683
- Title
- Object: Paul Pry at widow c-'s.
- Description
-
Mrs. Coutts stands in her bank, her back to a counter covered with money-bags, while huge sacks of sovereigns stand on the floor, giving a picture of limitless wealth. She looks towards Liston as Paul Pry who enters from the right, bowing low, umbrella under his arm and hat in hand. He says: Good Morning my dear Madam, I hope I don't intrude, Just dropp'd in, in, passing, to enquire after your welfare, sad times these for Bankers! I hope you'r all safe and sound, make both ends meet as usual? if it is not an impertinent question, your's is a profitable Business is it not? I should like to be a sleeping partner in your concern, O! by the bye I beg pardon, I had nearly forgot to ask how the Duke is, he's very often at your house they say, you have not made a Match of it yet have you? I hope no offence? merely asked by way of Conversation pon my honour. She answers: Indeed Mr Pry you are a most Impertinent fellow, and I desire that you will quit my House immediately. She is moustached, wears a much-feathered hat, a high-waisted pelisse bordered with ermine, and holds a reticule decorated with cornucopias. February 1826
Hand-coloured etching
- Production date
- 1826
- Dimensions
-
Height: 260 millimetres
-
Width: 364 millimetres
- $Inscriptions
-
- Curator's comments
- (Description and comment from M. Dorothy George, 'Catalogue of Political and Personal Satires in the British Museum', X, 1952)
For Mrs. Coutts and the Duke of St. Albans see No. 14874, &c.; for banking failures, 1825-6, No. 14814, &c; cf. No. 14809; for Paul Pry, No. 15138.
A plate by R. C. to Egan's Finish to the Adventures of Tom and Jerry, 1828 (B.M.L. C. 70. g. 15) is The Duchess of Do-Good's Screen. The Duchess of St. Albans displays a tall folding screen covered with caricatures of herself. The scale is very small and few of the many prints can be identified. Some (e.g. No. 14769) seem unconnected with the Duchess. But a Paul Pry resembles the P. P. of this print, and Nos. 13389, 14876 can be distinguished.
Reproduced, C. E. Pearse, The Jolly Duchess, 1913, p. 224.
- Location
- Not on display
- Acquisition date
- 1868
- Department
- Prints and Drawings
- Registration number
- 1868,0808.8683