print;
satirical print
- Museum number
- 1935,0522.11.53
- Title
- Object: Iohn Bull in clover Iohn Bull done over
- Description
-
Two designs, side by side, each with title. [1] John, a very fat and jovial 'cit', leans back in an arm-chair holding up a glass of port. On the table beside him (right) are a decanter of 'Port', round of beef (pushed aside), pipe, tobacco-box. An empty tankard lies on the floor. He says: "Well a glass of good Port cheers both Body and mind and enables one to gthrough [sic] the fatigues of Business. Here's a bumper to the great Chatham aye he was a statesman
A greater in England there never was known,
A friend to the People, a friend to the Throne."
On the wall is a framed portrait (three-quarter length) of 'Good Queen Bess' above three broadside ballads: 'The Land we live in'; 'Oh the roast Beef of Old England'; 'May we Live all the days of our Lives'. A fat bull-dog (left) gnaws a large bone. On the floor are also papers: 'Orders for Russia'; 'Good [sic] ship'd for America'; 'Ord . . .'; 'Good shipd for Spain'.
[2] John, lean, ragged and starving, sits in profile to the left, on a broken chair in a ruinous garret, contemplating suicide. The head and shoulders of a stout tax-collector appear outside a (broken) casement window; he says: "Oh there you are enjoying yourself! I have been kocking [sic] at the door this have hour. I want your property Tax I had a deal of trouble last time I thought you had run away." John: "Why there is very little of me left sure enough you need not trouble yourself to call any more, for that will be gone soon." He faces a table, with an open drawer, on which a razor lies on a book: 'Toughts [sic] on suicide by Danl Doleful'; there are also a broken pitcher, an onion, &c. A starving cat looks up at its master. On the floor is a torn and discarded 'Order Book'. A 'Gazette' with two columns headed respectively 'Bankrupts', 'Promo[tions', an attack on 'placemen'], lies on large papers headed 'Butchers Bill'. With these are an empty plate and spoon and burned-down candle. There is a miserable bed (right); laths show through the broken plaster. On the wall is a large half length print of 'Iohn Bellingham' above broadside-ballads: 'Oh Dear what can the matter be', and 'there's nae luck about the House'.
9 January 1819
Etching with hand-colouring
- Production date
- 1819
- Dimensions
-
Height: 242 millimetres
-
Width: 344 millimetres
- $Inscriptions
-
- Curator's comments
- (Description and comment from M. Dorothy George, 'Catalogue of Political and Personal Satires in the British Museum', IX, 1949)
The period of past prosperity is unspecified. The year 1818 had been one of abnormal prosperity with speculation and over-production leading to reaction and bankruptcies in the winter of 1818-19. The economic crisis produced a political crisis, implied in the portrait of Bellingham: his murder of Perceval had been justified and approved by Cobbett in his 'Political Register', see No. 11885. The Property (Income) Tax had been repealed, see No. 12750, &c. Cf. similar comparisons, Nos. 9714, 12502.
- Location
- Not on display
- Acquisition date
- 1935
- Department
- Prints and Drawings
- Registration number
- 1935,0522.11.53
