ne?
He's gone to fight the Frenchmen for George upon the throne,"--

is the motto of this print, which was published by Humphrey on February
6 of 1801. "The Bulstrode Siren" (Mrs. Billington), where she is seen
warbling to the Duke of Portland, fares little better than Emma herself;
and Sir William Hamilton appears, in another of Gillray's satires, as
"A Conoscenti contemplating ye beauties of ye Antique." Among these last
_objets d'art_ a battered "Lais" and a "Bacchante" who has lost her head
seem as full of cryptic allusion as the dancing figures on a Greek vase
and the Cupid with a bent arrow; while quite in Hogarth's best vein is
the "Mark Antony" framed upon the wall, in a cocked hat and admiral's
uniform, the "Cleopatra" with a gin bottle, and a view of Vesuvius in
full eruption.

Sheridan is a frequent figure in Gillray's political caricatures; but
perhaps he was never more happily treated than when he enters as
Harlequin, armed with a goose quill, and assisted by John Kemble and the
famous Mrs. Siddons, in "Blowing up the Pic Nics." To the same class and
subject of satire belongs the "Pic Nic Orchestra" and "Dilettante
Theatre"--this last a Green-room scene which seems reminiscent of
Hogarth's print of a similar subject. "Two-penny Whist" and "Push-pin"
are filled with contemporary portraits;[11] and the two series of
"Cockney Sportsmen" (4 plates, 1800) and "Elements of Skating" (4
plates, 1805) must not be overlooked any more than such weirdly hideous
creations as "Comfort to the Corns," as "Begone dull Care, I prithee,"
and "The Gout."

Interesting, however, though much of Gillray's social satire certainly
is, it scarcely reaches the same level as his political work. He was a
magnificent engraver, and was able in his best time to build up his
cartoon with the smallest possible scaffolding, a few lines pencilled
upon a card being enough to enable him to commence at once upon the
copper; while the freedom and facility of his design is witnessed amply
by all his prints--those prints which we have now studied in some
measure together, though anything in the nature of a comprehensive
catalogue is denied me by the space at my command. His influence, too,
upon Isaac Cruikshank is to be marked, as a link in the evolution of
English caricature.

In his later years James Gillray resided almost entirely with his kindly
publisher, Mrs. Humphrey, of whom, as I have noted, he has left a
whimsical portrait, with her