[11] From the gallows, immediately over his head, we are led to suppose the artist intended to hint that this gentleman died for the good of his country; but from the records of some of our mortuary historians, it appears that about the time this set of prints were published, a number of bodies thus preserved, which had been exsiccated by some mode of embalming at present unknown, were discovered in a vault in Whitechapel Church.
[12] This royal mummy, being once the sole tenant of one of the largest pyramids, might be more positively ascertained than any of the Cleopatras. It was, however, profanely removed by a wild Arab, who, after he had stolen it, sold it to the Consul of Alexandria, by whom it was transmitted to England: and a right grave antiquary quotes a passage in Sandys' Travels to prove its being genuine; where that learned and accurate voyager assures us that he saw the sepulchre empty, "which agrees exactly," saith he, "with the theft above mentioned." He omits to observe that Herodotus tells the same thing of it in his time.
[13] Carestini.
[14] A short time before the publication of these prints, the greatest part of our nobility acted as if they had been bitten by a tarantula. The sums lavished upon exotic warblers would have supported an army; the applause bestowed upon some of them would have turned the brain of a saint. It was little short of adoration. Persons of inferior rank caught this jingling contagion, and all orders of the people were infected with a musical mania, totally foreign to our national taste, and highly dishonourable to our national character. In one of Hogarth's former prints is a list of the rich presents Signior Farinelli, the Italian singer, condescended to accept from the English nobility and gentry for one night's performance in the opera of Artaxerxes! comprising gold snuff-boxes, diamond rings, diamond buckles, etc. That such presents were actually made is ascertained by the newspapers of the day.
[15] The group of which this is composed is worthy observation. The Counsellor is pointing to a friar and a nun who are in close conversation.
[16] Mrs. Lane (afterwards Lady Bingley).
[17] Fox Lane, her husband.
[18] Weideman.
[19] This curious delineation is whimsically placed immediately over the head of the Italian.
[20] Of the wisdom displayed in this judgment much has been said; I have sometimes thought that a decision of the great Frederick of Prussia's was equally deserving of record. When a list of criminals, who had forfeited their lives by violating the laws of their country, was once brought to him to sign, he observed the name of a soldier convicted of sacrilege.—"That a soldier of mine should be guilty of so atrocious a crime," said the king, "astonishes and distresses me. I will not, however, sign his death-warrant until I have examined him in person." The man was accordingly brought into the royal presence, and two monks, who were his accusers, declared that he had come into their church during the time they were celebrating mass, and placed himself under an image of the Virgin Mary, from whose shoes he had privately taken two pearl bows, and carried them out of the church: they pursued him, and found them in his pocket. The king, turning to the criminal, desired to know what he had to say in his defence? which was simply this: that he was a disbanded soldier, and in great distress for a dinner: that he walked into the churchyard, and earnestly prayed to the Virgin Mary that she would put him in the way of getting one: that she appeared to him, and told him she heard his supplications, and pitied his distress; to relieve which, she begged him to accept of some pearls which were on the feet of her image in the neighbouring church. When the doors opened, he walked into the church and took them out of her shoes, with an intention of converting them into money. "This," said the king, "alters the face of the business; but tell me, most reverend fathers, for you undoubtedly know, is it according to your canons possible that the Virgin could, to relieve distress and preserve a life, appear to this poor man in the way he describes?"—"Undoubtedly, my liege, she could, but it is not probable that she did." "Is it possible?"—"Certainly." "Very well. I will not let a soldier of mine suffer death upon probabilities. He shall be discharged this time; but observe what I say to you, young man; if at any future period I find that you accept another present from either virgin, saint, or angel, you shall be hanged."