ime when
these prints were first published, were noted for teaching the arts of
defence by different weapons, and who are here drawn from the life; one
of whom is a Frenchman, teacher of the small-sword, making a thrust with
his foil; the other an Englishman, master of the quarter-staff; the
vivacity of the first, and the cold contempt visible in the face of the
second, beautifully describe the natural disposition of the two nations.
On the left of the latter stands an improver of gardens, drawn also from
the life, offering a plan for that purpose. A taste for gardening,
carried to excess, must be acknowledged to have been the ruin of
numbers, it being a passion that is seldom, if ever, satisfied, and
attended with the greatest expense. In the chair sits a professor of
music, at the harpsichord, running over the keys, waiting to give his
pupil a lesson; behind whose chair hangs a list of the presents, one
Farinelli, an Italian singer, received the next day after his first
performance at the Opera House; amongst which, there is notice taken of
one, which he received from the hero of our piece, thus: "A gold
snuff-box, chased, with the story of Orpheus charming the brutes, by J.
Rakewell, esq." By these mementos of extravagance and pride, (for gifts
of this kind proceed oftener from ostentation than generosity,) and by
the engraved frontispiece to a poem, dedicated to our fashionable
spendthrift, lying on the floor, which represents the ladies of Britain
sacrificing their hearts to the idol Farinelli, crying out, with the
greatest earnestness, "one G--d, one Farinelli," we are given to
understand the prevailing dissipation and luxury of the times. Near the
principal figure in this plate is that of him, with one hand on his
breast, the other on his sword, whom we may easily discover to be a
bravo; he is represented as having brought a letter of recommendation,
as one disposed to undertake all sorts of service. This character is
rather Italian than English; but is here introduced to fill up the list
of persons at that time too often engaged in the service of the votaries
of extravagance and fashion. Our author would have it imagined in the
interval between the first scene and this, that the young man whose
history he is painting, had now given himself up to every fashionable
extravagance; and among others, he had imbibed a taste for cock-fighting
and horse-racing; two amusements, which, at that time, the man of
fashion could