icture
as prophetic; and so he seemed to regard it himself. The artist
worked with diligence, seemingly with an apprehension that he would
not live to complete the piece. Finish it, however, he did in a
masterly style, grouping everything that could denote the end of all
things. Prominent were a broken bottle, an old broom, a bow unstrung,
the butt-end of an old musket, a crown tumbled in pieces, towers in
ruins, the moon in her wane, the map of the globe burning, Ph[oe]bus
and his horses dead in the clouds, a vessel wrecked, Time with his
hourglass and scythe broken, a tobacco-pipe in his mouth, the last
puff of smoke going out; a play-book, with _Exeunt Omnes_ on one of
the open pages; an empty purse, and a statute of bankruptcy taken out
against nature.
"So far so good," said Hogarth. "Nothing remains but this,"--taking
his pencil and dashing off the similitude of a painter's palette
broken. "FINIS!" exclaimed the artist; "_the deed is done_--ALL IS
OVER." Hogarth never handled pencil again, and within a month of the
completion of this picture he was no more.
Transcriber's Notes:
There are a number of quotations in this work, many of which contain
archaic spelling and/or dialect. There are also several occurrences of
variant spelling and hyphenation used by the author. These have all
been retained as printed, with a few exceptions relating to proper
names or references to quotations, which are listed below. Printing
errors (transposed or missing letters, etc.) have been corrected
throughout.
^ has been used to indicate superscripted matter.
There are several instances of words containing the oe ligature. This
has been indicated by [oe].
This book sometimes uses asterisks to indicate an ellipsis.
Transcriber's Amendments:
Table of Contents - Chapter XVII - Mirando amended to Miranda -
"Miranda beseeching Prospero to allay the Wild Waters"
Table of Contents - Chapter XVIII - De'il amended to Deil - ""Address
to the Deil""
Page 66 - Hamadrydes amended to Hamadryades - "... and Hamadryades,
who are born and die with the oaks;"
Page 75 - Anguigen[oe] amended to Anguigenae - "... calls them
Anguigenae, serpent or snake-descended."
Page 84 - Phorcus amended to Phorcys - "Scylla, a daughter of
Phorcys ..."
Page 173 - De'il amended to Deil - ""Address to the Deil""
Page 177 - Boccacio amended to Boccaccio - "In the story of
_Isabe
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