Lettered within image with title and artist's initials, below with lines in Latin and publication line "Publd by Rd Spence 9th March 1808 Gt Ormond Street."
Library's copy is missing part of the imprint; imprint from British Museum online catalog.
A London street-lamp in the form of an obelisk is placed to show two faces of the obelisk, one (right) in shadow, the angle between them bisecting the design. The title is on both faces of the rectangular base. From the left of the obelisk projects a clear gas-lamp, from the right a murky oil-lamp emitting dense smoke. Round the former are butterflies, by the latter is a bat. Between them, on the apex of the obelisk, is a tilted (terrestrial) globe, the lower pole facing the oil-lamp, and dimmed with smoke. On each side of the obelisk is an interior. Under the gas-lamp (left) a young woman holds out a cloth to dry at a clear (coke) fire. On the chimney-piece is a large vase of flowers, erect and flourishing, and a branch-candlestick with three lighted candles. On the right an old woman holds a gridiron over an open (coal) fire, surrounded by clouds of smoke. On the partly obscured chimney-piece is a vase of wilting flowers and a candle lantern. Below: (left) "Dant clare incendia lucem" and (right) "Æstuat ac nigre semper fuligine squallet [sic] Tota Domus" [It burns and befouls the whole house with black soot].