For the benifit [sic] of the champion : a catch to be perform'd at the New Theatre Covent Garden ... / etch'd by T. Rowlandson.

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Thomas Rowlandson
1756-1827
For the benifit [sic] of the champion : a catch to be perform'd at the New Theatre Covent Garden ... / etch'd by T. Rowlandson.
etching with stipple
image: 218 x 337 mm; plate mark: 247 x 362 mm; sheet: 265 x 371 mm
Peel 2502
Provenance: 
Formerly owned by Sir Robert Peel.
Notes: 

Title etched below image.
Title continues: ... for admission apply to the D-ss.
Date of publication from Grego.
Text below title: NB. Gratis to those who wear large tails.

Summary: 

"The Duchess of Devonshire with two other catch-singers, Fox and North, who are dressed as fat old market-women. The Duchess (left) elegantly dressed, but with her breast uncovered and wearing her election hat with 'Fox' favours, feathers, and fox's brush, puts her left hand on Fox's shoulder, pointing to a tomb-stone beside her (left) inscribed, beneath its skull and cross-bones, 'Here lies poor C--C--L--RAY'. She sings: "Look neighbours look here lyes Poor C--ray [Cecil Wray]". Fox, his left hand grasping a crutch-headed stick, turning to North, sings "Dead & turn'd to Clay". North (right), also with a stick, sings "What Old C--l". Through the wings peers the anxious-looking, spectacled profile of Burke (right). Three framed pictures decorate the wall behind the performers: 'The fox who had lost his Tail' (cf. British Museum Satires No. 6530), a tail-less fox looking at four others who are discussing the situation. This is flanked by two oval pictures, 'Fox and Crow' (left), the fox looking up longingly at the crow on a branch, and 'Fox and Grapes' (right), a fox on its hind-legs below a vine-branch, cf. British Museum Satires No. 5962."--British Museum online catalogue.

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