"your claim to the throne, change
your name and the livery, and retire to some distant part of the earth,
where you may never be seen or heard of any more; and if L50,000 per
annum will not satisfy you--what will?" To which the queen (who assumes
an appearance of virtuous indignation) replies, "Nothing but a crown."
Brougham turns his back, saying, "I turn my back on such dirty work as
this," the fact being, as we have seen, that he had really entered into
negotiations with the ministers on the queen's behalf, which she
afterwards angrily repudiated. The devil pats him on the back. "Well
done, Broom," he says; "you have done your business well." By the side
of the queen stands a figure, possibly meant for Alderman Wood, carrying
"a shield for the innocent," and "a sword for the guilty"; behind her in
the distance is a ship, bearing the title of "The Wooden Walls of Old
England."

In our last chapter we mentioned the estimation in which the witnesses
against Caroline of Brunswick were held by her sympathizers and the
general public, and Robert's political views naturally inclined him to
take the popular side. Those who saw them before they were housed in
Cotton Garden, describe them as swarthy, dirty looking fellows, in
scanty ragged jackets and greasy leathern caps; at the bar of the House,
however, they looked as respectable as fine clothes and soap and water
could make them. To this a caricature of Robert's, entitled, _Preparing
the Witnesses--a View in Cotton Garden_, refers. Three dirty foreigners
are being washed, with no satisfactory result, in a bath labelled,
"Waters of Oblivion," "Non Mi Ricordo," and "Ministerial Washing Tub."
One of the operators (probably the Attorney-General, Sir Robert Gifford)
remarks that "he never had such a dirty job in his life"; seated around
are a number of equally dirty foreigners awaiting their turn. On the
same theme and in the same year we find _The Milan Commission_ (a very
rough affair); _The Master Cook and his Black Scullion composing a Royal
Hash_; and a satire on the alderman, who, in spite of his Carolinian and
popular sympathies, figures therein under the familiar title of "Mother
Wood."

1821.

The following year gives us _All My Eye_ (a skit upon Hone's "Eulogium
on the Radical Press"), representing a large eye, within the pupil of
which we see a printing press, whereon rests a portrait of Queen
Caroline; and also an admirable work, divided into two compartment