The conservative dinner

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Robert Seymour
1798-1836
The conservative dinner
wood engraving
70 x 85 mm
Purchased by J. Pierpont Morgan, 1900.
Peel 2124
Published: 
[London] : [publisher not specified], [ca. 1834]
Provenance: 
Formerly owned by Sir Robert Peel.
Notes: 

Probably detached from one of four issues of Whiggeries and waggeries, London : William Strange, 1934. This publication reprinted wood engravings by Robert Seymour, Robert Cruikshank, and others which had previously appeared-- with different captions-- in Figaro in London, also published by Strange. The identical image appeared in Figaro in London, no. 50, 1832, with the title Conservative dinner.

Summary: 

Wellington, in uniform, his back to the viewer, sits in a chair at a low table; the back of his chair is centred by a skull. Facing him as "Vice" is a repulsive bishop (Phillpotts). From under the cloth peeps out a demon-dog gnawing a bone inscribed "Bribe". Lyndhurst (?) sits on the Duke's right, carving a joint inscribed "Division of Countie's". Next to him is Wetherell eating "Bristol Fire". On Wellington's left is a bishop (Van Mildert, founder of Durham University in 1832), eating a tithe-pig and stirring a pot of "Durham Mustard". Next to him is Newcastle, holding up a glass inscribed "My Own". Next to him is Peel (?), intent on food. Cumberland's features emerge from smoke, as does the head of a trumpeter blowing the trumpet of the Tory Press, the "Morning Post" and the "Standard".

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