The mothers girl, plucking a crow, or, German flesh & English Spirit!

Image not available
Robert Cruikshank
1789-1856
The mothers girl, plucking a crow, or, German flesh & English Spirit!
[London] : Pubd by SW Fores No 50 Piccadilly, April 28th 1816.
etching, hand colored
image: 229 x 330 mm; plate mark: 259 x 350 mm; sheet: 269 x 404 mm
Bequest of Gordon N. Ray, 1987.
1986.502
Provenance: 
From the library of Gordon N. Ray.
Notes: 

By George Cruikshank.

Summary: 

Print shows Princess Charlotte rising from a writing-table and overturning her chair; she takes a stride towards Queen Charlotte at right, lunging at her with outstretched left fist; her pen still in her right hand. A letter on her desk begins 'My dear Mother'. The Queen, much burlesqued, flinches back in alarm. The Princess says: "C--e me if you shall,--Have her present I will: & I'll soon convince you that I'll think & speak, & act for myself and I have no fear of finding plenty of Friends & no German shall ever govern me, if they think to do it they will be devilishly mistaken." The Queen, in old-fashioned dress, with pointed stomacher, answers: "You think indeed? I'll let you know Miss, that you shall do as I order; Have no one about you but those I shall choose for you; Live where & how I please; Keep what company I like & conduct yourself exactly in my way.--She be present indeed!! I say she sha'nt that she sha'nt; Pray who are you writing to?--I will see--" The Princess wears a white décolletée dress, with an ermine-bordered robe hanging from her shoulders, and a small crown. Prince Leopold, a grotesque 'foreigner' in hussar uniform, peeps in round the door, dismayed at the fracas; he says: "She does not take her lesson so quiet as I did I suppose we must have two pair of Breeches." On the wall is a pair of bust portraits, side by side: the Princess of Wales, young, comely and serene, the Queen ugly and antique. The frames are respectively surmounted by coronet and feathers, and by a royal crown, the glass of the latter being badly starred. Cf. British Museum online catalog.

Artist page: 
Classification: 
Department: