Rowlandson the Caricaturist; a Selection from His Works. Vol. 2 by Joseph Grego

Rowlandson sculp. Published by T. Tegg (276).--Four well-fed Commissioners, the members of a board, seated at the green baize, are cross-questioning a Quaker, represented in a suit of conventional sad-coloured apparel, and wearing the typical broad-brimmed hat. The humility of the sectarian has proved too deep for the inquisitors, whose exactions he is evading. The chairman is indignantly remarking, 'What an impertinent fellow to keep on his hat before such a dignified assembly!' Cries one of the examiners, 'None of your _thees_ and _thous_ here, sir--come to the point--we know you have evaded certain duties.' 'Pray, sir, do you know what we sit here for?' pertinently demands another commissioner; to which the Quaker, with clasped hands, and rocking himself, like _Mawworm_, on his toes, responds, 'Verily I do--some sit here for five hundred, others for a thousand; and moreover I have heard it reported that some sit here for two thousand pounds per annum!' [Illustration: DR. SYNTAX, IN THE MIDDLE OF A SMOKING HOT POLITICAL SQUABBLE, WISHES TO WET HIS WHISTLE.]