March 6, 1800. [Dr. Botherum, the Mountebank.]—From the bustle and life visible on all sides it would seem that the period is fair-time, when the rustics and agricultural population of the vicinity in general flock into the town, holiday-making. A travelling mountebank has established his theatre in the market place; the person of the ingenious charlatan is decked out in a fine court dress, with bag wig, powder, sword, and laced hat complete, the better to excite the respect of his audience; he is holding forth on the marvellous properties ascribed to the nostrums which he is seeking to palm off on the simple villagers as wonder-working elixirs; while his attendants, Merry Andrew and Jack Pudding, are going through their share of the performance. One branch of the mountebank physician's profession was the drawing of teeth; an unfortunate sufferer is submitting himself to the hands of the empiric's assistant. The rural audience is stolidly contemplating the antics of the party, without being particularly moved by Dr. Botherum's imposing eloquence, these vagabond scamps being frequently clever rogues, blessed with an inexhaustible fund of bewildering oratory, and witty repartee at glib command. Leaving the quack, we find plentiful and suggestive materials to employ the humourist's skilful graver scattered around. In the centre, a scene of jealousy is displayed; the beguilements of a portly butcher are prevailing against the assumed privileges of a slip-shod tailor, who is seemingly tempted to have recourse to his sheers, to cut the amorous entanglement summarily asunder. On the left, the promiscuous and greedy feeding associated with 'fairings,' is going busily forward, and on the opposite side are exhibited all the drolleries which can be got out of a Jew pedlar, his pack, the diversified actions of customers he is trying to tempt with his wares, and the bargains for finery into which the fair and softer sex are vainly trying to beguile the cunning Hebrew on their own accounts.
DR. BOTHERUM, THE MOUNTEBANK.
It seems probable that Rowlandson in his print of Doctor Botherum may have had a certain Doctor Bossy in his eye, a German practitioner of considerable skill, who enjoyed a comfortable private practice, said to have been the last of the respectable charlatans who exhibited in the British metropolis. This benevolent empiric, as Angelo informs us, dispensed medicines and practised the healing art, publicly and gratuitously on a stage, his booth being erected weekly in the midst of Covent-Garden Market, where the mountebank, handsomely dressed and wearing a gold-laced cocked hat, arrived in his chariot with a liveried servant behind.
According to the old custom, the itinerant quack doctor, with his attendant gang, was as constant a visitor at every market-place as the pedlar with his pack.
March 12, 1800. Humbugging, or Raising the Devil. Published by R. Ackermann, 101 Strand.—A credulous personage, who, judging from his costume, is in a fair position in life, has called to consult a necromancer. The enchanter has a venerable beard, and a divining rod; according to usage, he has made a circle of skulls, toads, and other inviting objects, in the centre of which, through a stage trap, he is raising the 'very deil,' and has conjured up a pantomimic demon, horned, winged, and grotesquely arranged, holding in one hand a gore-stained dagger, and a goblet of suppositious blood in the other. The knees of the befooled spectator are trembling beneath him; his back is turned to a curtain which conceals a fair enchantress, who is assisting the invocation, and giving a practical turn to the delusion by removing a well-filled pocket-book from the coat-tail of the simple victim. In the background is the traditional whiskered cat, and the folio of cabalistic signs; a stuffed crocodile is suspended from the roof.
March 12, 1800. Hocus Pocus, or Searching for the Philosopher's Stone. Rowlandson del. and sculp. Published by R. Ackermann, 101 Strand.—Companion plate to 'Humbugging, or raising the Devil.' The artist introduces us to the laboratory of a so-called alchemist. A roguish Jew and his familiar are busily engaged in the transmutation of metals; the servant, with a pair of long-nozzled bellows, is engaged in kindling the furnace, in which is a crucible; various retorts, alembics, and other paraphernalia of the 'black arts,' are scattered about, as well as a formula for 'changing lead into gold;' although the alchemists at best could only contrive to accomplish the reverse transmutation. Suggestive prints are hung on the walls of this chamber of mystery, such as the portrait of the notorious 'Count Cagliostro, discoverer of the Philosopher's Stone,' and the figure of the spurious 'Bottle Conjurer.'