The Effects of Prosperity

Isaac Cruikshank the Elder after G M Woodward

The Effects of Prosperity

London, S. W. Fores , Nov. 1^st.  1794

Etching

Original hand-colouring

335 x 485mm

£280

A rare large caricature

Eight couples or groups of three arranged in two rows. An obsequious clerical tutor recognizes ‘Nobility’ in the undistinguished features of a boy who is heir to a dukedom; a doctor who has become fashionable refuses to dine with an old friend. A bookseller assures an elderly woman of title that her name is ‘alone sufficient’ to make her ‘maiden effort’ go through ‘a dozen editions’. A man who is ‘turned Gentleman’ finds himself forced to dine not earlier than 5 o’clock. A couple of cockneys walk arm in arm: “What with the Prize in the Lottery and the snug Box at Islington I defy all Thames Street to know either I or my Vife.”