came to his rescue, in a personal satire, by me, with some parts ready sunk, as called the "Epistle to Hogarth." The the background and the dog, I began quarrel only shows how furiously angry to consider how I could put so much men could abuse each other; both work laid aside to account, and so Wilkes and Churchill had been personal patched up a print of Master Churchill friends with the artist, and now they in the character of a bear. The pleavigorously abused him. The world has sure and pecuniary advantage derived much to regret in the loss of so vigorous from these two engravings, together with a poet as Churchill, from the fact of occasionally riding on horseback, rehis being led away to vice and dissipa- stored me to as much health as can be tion. The satirist whom Cowper owned expected at my time of life." as his master, and who has much of the manly freedom and masterly ease of Dryden was an ally on the side of virtue, of whom the best might be proud. Alas, that he spent his talent upon personal abuse, or in vain regret. He attacked Hogarth as Pope attacked Dennis, upon his old age, and declared" that malice led him to satirise Wilkes. "Malice (who, disappointed of her end, Whether to work the bane of foe or friend, verge, Had WILKES and LIBERTY escaped thy scourge. Surely it is no crime to be sick and old, feeble and weak with disease. Hogarth might have retorted upon that weakness which proceeds from dissipation; more cutting probably was the allusion to Hogarth's failure. "Poor Sigismunda! what a fate is thine! Hogarth speaks thus lightly of the fray, but it probably broke his spirits and hurt his health. Churchill, who was an unfrocked clergyman, and a man of the loosest life, was unworthy of notice. A short time after he writes thus heartlessly of the old and failing painter. (naming his mistress) tells me with a kiss, that I have already killed him. How sweet is flattery from the woman we love ;" and again, even more heartlessly, the malevolent satirist says-" he has broken into the pale of my private life, and has set the example of illiberality which I wanted, and as he is dying from the effects of my former chastisement, I will hasten his death by writing his elegy." Even Wilkes, debauched as he was, was more generous than Churchill: he remarked of his squinting portrait, "that he did not make himself," and therefore might be excused for being so very ugly, but Churchill exulted over the painter's failing health, and when he heard of his death, rejoiced that it was imputed to the terrors of his satire. Dryden, the great High Priest of all the nine We are now to chronicle the last Revived thy name, gave what a muse could give, And in his numbers bade thy mem'ry live; work of Hogarth, which we think shows But, 'how fallen! how changed!' a failing power, and an exaggeration Doth Sigismunda now devoted stand, of which the painter was not always The helpless victim of a dauber's hand!" guilty. It is termed “Credulity, SuperThat these attacks wounded Hogarth stition, and Fanaticism," and seems to and hastened his decline, there can be be intended by the artist to show the little doubt. He retorted on Churchill, effects of a low conception of religion, by a caricature called "The Bruiser C. and also the idolatrous tendency of Churchill, (once the Rev.) in the cha- pictures and prints in churches or in racter of the Russian Hercules regaling books. A fierce preacher seems to be himself after having killed the monster condemning with terrific energy the Caricatura, that so galled his virtuous whole world to perdition, such is the friend, the 'heaven-born' Wilkes." fury of his looks and gestures. His Churchill was drawn as a canonical bear, congregation are in a terror of alarm, with a pot of porter and a knotted club, and are thrown into various gestures bearing on the various knots "Lye 1, typical of their state, and in the corner Lye 2," and so on, by his side Hogarth's the notorious Mrs. Tofts, whose imposdog tramples on his "Epistle to Ho-ture is unequalled in the annals of garth." The intrusion of the painter's credulity, seems to have added a quandog by the side of the "Russian bear" tity of monsters to the scene. At the is accounted for by Hogarth in the fol- window a Turk, calmly smoking, looks lowing manner: "having an old plate in at the window, apparently drawing a very satisfactory parallel between the workings of his religion and that which he witnesses The aim of Hogarth was no doubt good, but it is not too clearly perceived in this curious print, and those who sneer at religion, sometimes allude to this engraving as a proof that Hogarth sneered too, which is very far indeed from the fact. ceived an agreeable letter from a friend, he wrote a rough draft of an answer, and finding himself weak, postponed writing the letter, and lay down upon his bed. He had lain but a short time when he was seized with a vomiting, and starting up, he rang the bell with such violence that he broke it. An affectionate female relative came to his aid, and after two hours' intense suffering, he expired from a suffusion of blood among the arteries of his heart. So lived and died William Hogarth, a genius entirely English, and master of a style of which he might have said with Swift, "Which I was born to introduce, Refined it first, and showed its use." The time had now come when he was to find a consolation in religion. He had bought a small house at Chiswick, which yet remains; it is not very far from the one occupied by the Duke of Devonshire, and is still called Hogarth House, and to this he retired; at that time indeed it might have been called retirement, for it was very prettily situated, and the garden contained many fruit-trees, and in it he had And in which, although he has had buried his favourite dog, the headstone many imitators, he has not had one of whose grave, standing in a corner of worthy successor. His great success the garden, close against the wall, still in his own peculiar style, and his entire remains. The cottage has since been difference from other painters, seems inhabited by another man of genius, to lie in this, that he paints perfectly the Rev. Henry Cary, the translator of dramatically, and takes care to let his Dante. It was in this cottage that own peculiar mind pervade his pictures. Hogarth felt death coming upon him, No painter ever told a story better than but his spirits did not desert him; he Hogarth. He is not entirely a painter, seems to have summed up his actions he may be called an author, and viewed of past life, and to have been as much in that light we shall understand the as most men at peace with the world, answer given by the gentleman who, and with his Creator. "I can safely Charles Lamb tells us, being asked assert," he writes, "that I have invari- which book he preferred most, said, ably endeavoured to make those about " 'Shakspere," and which next, said, me tolerably happy; and my greatest "Hogarth." Most of his admirers have enemy cannot say, that I ever did him felt the truth of this; they read his an intentional injury; without ostenta- pictures, at those of other painters they tion I could produce many instances merely look. Great draughtsmen and of men who have materially benefited fine colourists some artists may be, but by me. What may follow, God knows.' they do not throw the soul into their This reasoning is scarcely satisfactory pictures which Hogarth did. In the to the Christian, alas! That many men painted illustrations of the "Waverly have materially benefited by our weak Novels," or of "Gil Blas," or of the endeavours to do good is not sufficient; "Vicar of Wakefield," we see various the better the man, the less confidently figures over and over again, to reprewill he look back upon his past life; the sent the "Vicar," or "Gil Blas;" but in great Newton talked sorrowfully of wasted painting the "Rake" or "Councillor time, and Coleridge, weeping, confessed Silvertongue," or Viscount Squanderthat even then, in his last few days he, felt," Hogarth has indelibly fixed them who had been praying all his life, on our minds, and they will bear no scarcely knew "how to pray." second impression. All his pictures are of this kind. The puzzled face, rather indeed prosaic, of the distressed poet, we never forget; the vapid face of the young nobleman, the conceit of the Italian singer, are to us as much matters of fact and reality, as the madness of Don Quixote, or the burlesque cowardice of John Falstaff. More than this, Hogarth stands alone, he is sui generis, and with On the 25th of October, 1764, Hogarth left Chiswick, and returned to Leicester Square. He was very weak, but at the same time extremely cheerful, and his mental powers were as perfectly unimpaired as ever. Physicians do not appear to have been with him, and of the nature of his complaint he himself was unaware. Having re 66 out a rival; Sir Joshua Reynolds foolishly denied him the title of "painter." That he could paint, and in many points better and more solidly than Sir Joshua himself in his" flying colours," the scenes of the "Rake's Progress" in Sir John Soane's Museum, abundantly testify; but he does not want the petty title, he was no Royal Academician we know, but there have been many hundreds of painters, and but one Hogarth. The history of his five days' peregrination to Gravesend and Rochester will show what sort of man he was, better than any laboured description. Under the town-hall in Rochester, the curious are still shown the place where he publicly played at hop-scotch with a jovial companion, to the great delight of the onlooking boys. His personal spirit was great, and he would resent any insult offered by any one, nor did he Besides this, he was like all great bend in any way to rank or power. men, evidently of his age, and yet beyond He loved state in dress, and a certain it. His satire upon its defective morals decent order in his household; his wife will testify the latter, and for the former who tenderly loved him, assisting him we may cite Walpole. "The Rake's in entertaining his guests at a pleasant Levee Room," says that author, "The house and handsomely furnished table. Nobleman's Dining-room, the apart-"In his relations of husband, of broments of the husband and wife, in the ther, friend, and master," says Ireland, Marriage à la Mode, the Alderman's "he was kind, generous, sincere, and inParlour, the Bedchamber, and many dulgent; in diet abstemious, but in his others are the history of the manners hospitalities, though devoid of ostentaof the age." tion, liberal and free-hearted, not parThis is high praise, "but greater yet simonious, yet frugal; but so compararemains behind;" he was not only the tively small were the rewards paid to historian, but the moralist of his time; artists, that after the labour of a long in openly reproving vice, he stood out life, he left an inconsiderable sum to beyond all other painters. Art in his his widow, with whom he must have hand did not degenerate into sensuous- received a very large portion." To this ness and prettiness, nor did he excite another biographer adds, that he was religion by the faces of meek Madonnas, very considerate and kind to all his or emaciated saints; but he showed servants, that they had remained many vice her own image, stamped the paltry years in his service, and that he painted and conceited coxcomb with a brand; all their portraits, and hung them up placed abject poverty, copied with an in his house. He used to study at all unerring hand, by the side of prodigal times and in all places; he would sketch and selfish wealth, and preached such a any remarkable face which he saw, sermon thereon, as the world will not sometimes upon his nail. He was a easily forget. If fame be worth any great observer of the workings of the thing, he has fame enough; the portrait passions in the face. Barry once saw painters and effeminate flatterers of the him patting the back of one of two dayfwere ashamed to own his masculine fighting boys, who was hanging back genius; the sentence is now reversed, from the fray, and telling him not to there is scarcely an educated English-be a coward, all the while very attenman, but who is proud to own that he tively observing the face of the other. is the countryman of William Hogarth. He went into good society, and dined In his personal appearance, Hogarth with Gray, at the table cf Horace Walwas not singular. His portrait gives pole. He left his wife by his will, all us a blunt English-looking face, marked his property in his plates, the copyright with great determination and self-pos- of which was secured to her by Act of session; his eye was peculiarly bright Parliament for twenty years; the numand penetrating, and his forehead high ber of impressions annually sold, proand broad. He was rather below the duced a very respectable annual income, middle size, active in person, and bust- but she outlived her right and became ling in manner, and fond of some little reduced to the borders of want. The importance and state; he had a great interposition of the king with the deal of bonhommie, and was sought for Royal Academy, procured for her a as an excellent companion; when out pension of £40 per annum, which she on a trip or jaunt his spirits rose to a lived but two years to enjoy. great height, and kept the company in a considerable state of amusement. Hogarth was buried plainly and without show, in the churchyard of Chiswick, and his wife raised a monument to his memory, bearing the following inscription: "Here lieth the body of Willliam Hogarth, Esq., who died Oct. 26th, 1764, aged 67 years." A mask, a laurel wreath, a palette, pencils, and book, inscribed "Analysis of Beauty," are carved on one side of the monument, with some verses, which, by the way, are not worth quoting. Dr. Johnson wrote four lines which are somewhat better, but which are certainly not worthy of the Doctor, or of the painter: The hand of him here torpid lies, That drew the essential forms of grace. Here closed in death the attentive eyes That saw the manners in the face. father had left him a small fortune, and this placed him in a position which gave him leisure to indulge in talents, which he had manifested at an early age. These were caricaturing and songwriting. Even at school he had shown extraordinary talent in turning to ridicule any prominent feature of those who annoyed him. But this is a story related of almost every clever boy,-a story which has furnished very many pictures of rebellion to scholastic authority, which it were better, perhaps, altogether to repress. The world seems too satisfied in taking scholastic insubordination as a proof of talents. When Sayer grew up he soon gave a proof of his talent, and finding that the majority of the caricaturists were upon the side of the people, and few or none upon that of the government, he appears to have been partly biassed by early predilections, and partly by interest, in taking the ministerial side in the warfare of political pasquinade, song, and print. He appears to have, in his earliest specimens, courted the favour of the Right Hon. William Pitt, who was then, by his extraordinary genius, astonishing the nation, and alarming the opposition. On May the 7th, 1782, Mr. Pitt made his first motion for the reform of the representation, a motion which procured him considerable popularity, but which was defeated by a small majority. Under the Shelburne administration, Mr. Pitt held office as Chancellor of the Exchequer, but the alliance of the Whigs and Tories drove this ministry from office. Another body, similar in construction to this, seceded from Lord North, and professed themselves the friends and supporters to the court, in opposition to the new ministry. Of these Pitt was the recog One must not omit to add that the latter days of Hogarth, himself a caricaturist, were wearied out by attacks by anonymous brothers of the art. After the publication of his "Analysis of Beauty," a great number of caricatures were launched forth against him, and every possible means taken to annoy and disturb him. His ridicule of the absurd idolatry shown to the ancient masters by those who, with pretended taste, formed large collections of copies, called forth a large print, wherein he is represented in the act of undermining the sacred monument of all the best painters, sculptors, &c., in imitation of the Greek Erostratus, who, in the distance, is seen firing the Temple of Diana; other caricatures represent him in his studio, where are hung parodies of his paintings. The artists of these works are anonymous, but we cite them-and we have not mentioned a tythe of the prints launched against Hogarth-to shew that when he died, in October, 1764, he left many behind him to follow in the career of political caricaturists. His greatest persecutor, if we ex-nised and powerful leader in the House cept Wilkes, Charles Churchill, did not long survive the victim whose death he rejoiced to have caused. He died at Calais in November of the same year. Caricature was carried on after the death of Hogarth by various hands, the most noted of whom was JAMES SAYER, of Commons, and James Sayer, the volunteer caricaturist in the print shops of London. One of his earliest productions is a large caricature published on the 5th of May, 1783, founded upon a speech made by one of the opposition Lords, in the Upper House, immediately after the formation of the new ministry, who, speaking of Lord North, had expressed himself as follows:"Such was the love of office of the noble Lord, that, finding he would not the son of a captain merchant, at Yarmouth, and after being articled to an attorney, passed his examination, and was entered on the roll. Sayer, how-be permitted to mount the box, he had ever, did not need to follow the labor- been content to get up behind." The ious and dry study of the law. His new Whig coach, with Fox's crest on the panels, is drawn by two miserable blocks, bearing the portraits of the hacks through a rough road, jogging popular political leaders of the day. So and nearly being upset, every minute, by some of the large stones thrown in its way by the opposition, and by which one of the wheels has received a very serious fracture. Lord North is holding on behind with an air of alarm, whilst Fox and the Duke of Portland, seated on the box, are joining in their efforts to draw in the reins. Contemplating this print one cannot but think upon the many times which the subject has been repeated. Almost every ministry has been typified by a coach, and the reins of government have been spoken of in the same terms as the reins of the stage coachman. We need but turn over a very few leaves of our contemporary Punch to find the same idea repeated over and over again. that the historian of political warfare, turning over the many similar prints which like exigences have called forth, cannot but remember, with a sigh, that there is "nothing new" under the sun. Another plate, by the same hand, represents Britannia pointing with her finger, and directing the attention of the coalition (Fox and North, who are joined together something like the Siamese twins) to a distant block and a gallows, by which the artist means to insinuate that a violent and shameful death was the proper destination of the ministry. Here we may remark, that Britannia at this period was the presiding genius of caricature, and that John Bull had not arisen to the prominence which he at present occupies. Aided by such means as these out of doors, which gradually undermined whatever popularity the ministry had, Pitt shewed that he was no unskilful leader of an opposition. He let the ministry, by ceaseless provocation and other parliamentary tactics, make themselves ridiculous in the eyes of the House, so that their majority of sixty gradually dwindled down to a ridiculously small number. In July the parliament separated, and the ministry were left to prepare some great measures which they were about to bring forward for the consideration of the legislature. Parliament met on the 11th of November, and the first measure which was brought forward was the bill for the regulation of India. It passed through the House of Commons by large majorities, and out of doors the people at large were interested in its fate. "The Politicians of London, who are at present a most numerous corporation”· writes Horace Walpole, On the 21st of April, 1783, Sayer again satirized the whole of the ministry, and the print is valuable by afford ing the historian undoubted portraits of the New Whig Administration, as it was called. The plate is entitled, "The Razor's Levee; or the Heads of the New Whig A -n on a broad bottom." The scene is the shop of a barber, who is busily engaged in arranging a quantity of blocks, representing the members of the coalition ministry. He is particularly occupied on the heads of Fox and North, joined on one stand, to intimate what some of the present day would call an unprincipled coalition. On a wall immediately behind are the heads of Cromwell and Charles the 1st, in a curious juxtaposition, apparently to intimate that the most opposite principles were for the first time brought together. Over the fireplace is a new map of Great Britain and Ireland, from which Ireland is nearly torn away. The celebrated are warm on a bill for the new reguWestminster publican, Sam House, of lation of the East Indies, brought in whom we shall hereafter have to speak, by Mr. Fox. Some of his associates and who described himself as "a pub-apprehended his being beaten, but his lican and republican," sits in front with marvellous abilities have hitherto tria pot of beer, and looks on admiringly. umphed, and on two divisions in the This caricature cannot also fail to call House of Commons he had majorities to mind similar prints of a more modern of 109 and 114. . . The forces will be date. When Mr. Gilbert Albert à more nearly balanced when the Lords Becket first started that rabid political fight the battle. . . . In Parliamentary paper, Figaro in London-the illustra-engagements a superiority of numbers tive cut on the title had the same scene is not vanquished by the talents of the as the one described. Figaro, the bar-commanders, as often happens in more ber, is about to sharpen his razor, and martial encounters. His competitor, to proceed to operate upon various Mr. Pitt, appears by no means an ade 66 H |