published Feb 6th, 1801 by H. (Hannah) Humphrey
plate 497, most likely from Henry G. Bohn's The Works of James Gillray, 1851
Description: A bedroom scene. Lady Hamilton, grotesquely fat, but with traces of beauty in her features, rises from a curtained bed, arms and one leg extended in a burlesqued gesture of despair. She wears a nightgown and lace-trimmed cap. Behind her in the shadowed depths of the bed the night-capped head of her elderly and (?) sleeping husband, rests on the pillow. She looks, weeping, towards an open sash-window through which is seen a fleet sailing towards the horizon. In the window (left) is a cushioned window seat on which (besides a stocking) is an open book: 'Studies of Academic Attitudes taken from the Life'; on one page is a nude woman lying in sensual abandonment. On the right against the curtains of the bed is a dressing-table on which, besides toilet-articles, are a flask of 'Maraschino', a 'Composing Draught', and a pot of 'Rouge à la Naples'. On the carpeted floor (right) are objects from Sir W. Hamilton's collection, with an open book: 'Antiquities of Herculaneum Naples Caprea &c. &c.'; on the right page is a satyr chasing a nymph. They include an oval gem, a figure of a squatting monster, headless, the base inscribed 'Pri[apus]', a laughing bust of 'Messalina', statues of a Venus and a Satyr, coins or medals, one inscribed 'Ovid', another 'Tibertius'. In front of Lady Hamilton are the slippers she has kicked off, and a garter inscribed 'The Hero of the Nile'. Below the design:
"Ah, where, & ah where, is my gallant Sailor gone" ? -
"He's gone to Fight the Frenchmen, for George upon the Throne,
"He's gone to Fight ye Frenchmen, t'loose t'other Arm & Eye,
"And left me with the old Antiques, to lay me down, & Cry."
image measures approximately: 14" W x 10 1/2" H
frame measures approximately: 22 3/4" W x 18 3/4" H
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S1.