The acquittal!, or, The managers poisened with a beer of their own brewing

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Charles Williams
1796-1866
The acquittal!, or, The managers poisened with a beer of their own brewing
hand colored etching
image: 237 x 346 mm; sheet: 253 x 360 mm
Purchased by J. Pierpont Morgan, 1900.
Peel 1899
Published: 
[London] : S.W. Fores, 50 Piccadilly, 1806 June 24.
Provenance: 
Formerly owned by Sir Robert Peel.
Notes: 

Lettered: "Pubd June 24th 1806 by S W Fores 50 Piccadilly."
Library's copy trimmed within plate mark.

Summary: 

Melville (l.) stands by a pile of bricks, each marked with a coronet (except one with a mitre), and the words "Not Guilty". These he is hurling with great vigour at (some of) the managers of the impeachment who flee in disorder, to the right., putting up their arms to fend off the missiles. He wears Highland dress with a magnificently feathered bonnet; his plaid swirls out. He says, the words in a large label: '"Self-preservation's Heaven's eldest law. [...] "Then to encounter violence with Force.'" His bricks are stacked on a fringed carpet on which is the motto "Dieu et m[on] Droit". Sheridan, the hindmost, protects himself with his hat, and says: "Why Charley! I am afraid we have drank too much of this cursed Entire." Just in front of him is Whitbread, an "Essay on Brewing" projecting from his coat-pocket.

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