Plate 5. The Father of the Family.
The doctors say that you're my booty;
Come, sir, for I must do my duty.
Death, in this picture, has rather a hard tussle for it. His friends, the learned physicians, who are pocketing their fees, and turning their backs on their late patient, are hurrying away. Death, with a great show of force, has seized his victim, still in the pride of manhood, by the dressing-gown, and is seeking to drag him from the frantic embraces of those to whom his life is dear. The father and mother are remonstrating with this merciless abductor; the blooming wife and infants of the unfortunate are cast down in despair; his sisters have seized him boldly round the waist, and, one behind the other, are making a sturdy stand against the fatal messenger; the servants and all the inmates of the noble mansion have rushed out, and are endeavouring by their entreaties, or by a show of resistance, to stay the steps of the tyrant.
Plate 6. The Fall of Four-in-Hand.
Death can contrive to strike his blows
By overturns and overthrows.
Death has come again, in his irresistible shape, and he has found the occasion ready to his hand. A dashing charioteer, a man of wealth and fashion, with a gaily attired female by his side, is tearing along, eager
to leave behind
The common coursers of the wind,
In more than phaetonic state,
For every horse had won a plate.
But on arriving at a low bridge, which spans a torrent, the blood horses become unmanageable; the driver sighs for a 'tight postilion,' and behold on the 'leader' is seated one who will spur the whole team to destruction; the horses are sent over the narrow bridge, the tall curricle is capsized, and eternity is instantly opened to the careless pleasure-seekers.
Plate 7. Gaffer Goodman.
Another whiff, and all is o'er,
And Gaffer Goodman is no more.