Jockey.—I, Jockey, turne the stone of all your plots,
For none turnes faster than the turne-coat Scots.
Presbyter.—We for our ends did make thee king, be sure,
Not to rule us, we will not that endure.
King.—You deep dissemblers, I kow what you doe,
And, for revenges sake, I will dissemble too.
Charles’s defeat and flight from Worcester furnished materials for a much more elaborate caricature than most of the similar productions of this period, and of a somewhat singular design. It was published on the 6th of November, 1651, and bears the title “A Mad Designe; or a Description of the king of Scots marching in his disguise, after the Rout at Worcester.” A long, and not unnecessary, explanation of the several groups forming this picture, enables us to understand it. On the left Charles is seated on the globe “in a melancholy posture.” A little to the right, and nearly in front, the bishop of Clogher is performing mass, at which lords Ormond and Inchquin, in the shapes of strange animals, hold torches, and the lord Taaf, in the form of a monkey, holds up the bishop’s train. The Scottish army is seen marching up, consisting, according to the description, of papists, prelatical malignants, Presbyterians, and old cavaliers; the latter of whom are represented by the “fooles head upon a pole in the rear.” The next group consists of two monkeys, one with a fiddle, the other carrying a long staff with a torch at the end, concerning which we learn that “The two ridiculous anticks, one with a fiddle, and the other with a torch, set forth the ridiculousness of their condition when they marched into England, carried up with high thoughts, yet altogether in the darke, having onely a fooles bawble to be their light to walke by, mirth of their own whimsies to keep up their spirits, and a sheathed sword to truste in.” Next come a troop of women, children, and papists, lamenting over their defeat. Two monkeys on foot, and one on horseback, follow, the latter riding with his face turned to the horse’s tail, and carrying in his hand a spit with provisions on it. It is explained as “The Scots Kings flight from Worcester, represented by the foole on horseback, riding backward, turning his face every way in feares, ushered by duke Hambleton and the lord Wilmot.” Lastly, a crowd of women with flags bring up the rear. It cannot be said that the wit displayed in this satire is of the very highest order.
No. 183. Arthur Haselrigg.
After this period we meet with comparatively few caricatures until the death of Cromwell, and the eve of the Restoration, when there came a new and fierce struggle of political parties. The Dutch were the subject of some satirical prints and pamphlets in 1652; and we find a small number of caricatures on the social evils, such as drunkenness and gluttony, and on one or two subjects of minor agitation. With the close of the Commonwealth a new form of caricature came in. Playing cards had, during this seventeenth century, been employed for various purposes which were quite alien to their original character. In France they were made the means of conveying instruction to children. In England, at the time of which we are speaking, they were adopted as the medium for spreading political caricature. The earliest of these packs of cards known is one which appears to have been published at the very moment of the restoration of Charles II., and which was, perhaps, engraved in Holland. It contains a series of caricatures on the principal acts of the Commonwealth, and on the parliamentary leaders. Among other cards of a similar character which have been preserved is a pack relating to the popish plot, another relating to the Rye House conspiracy, one on the Mississippi scheme, published in Holland, and one on the South Sea bubble.