DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.61480#0121
THE INVASION; OR, FRANCE AND ENGLAND.
In the two following designs, Mr. Hogarth has displayed that partiality for his own
country and contempt for France, which formed a strong trait in his character. He
neither forgot nor forgave the insults he suffered at Calais, though he did not recollect
that this treatment originated in his own ill humour, which threw a sombre shade over
every object that presented itself. Having early imbibed the vulgar prejudice that
one Englishman was a match for four Frenchmen, he thought it would be doing his
country a service to prove the position. How far it is either useful or politic to depre-
ciate the power, or degrade the character of that people with whom we. are to contend
is a question which does not come within the plan of this work. In some cases it may
create confidence, but in others lead to the indulgence of that negligent security by
which armies have been slaughtered, provinces depopulated, and kingdoms changed
their rulers.
PLATE I.
FRANCE.
With lantern jaws and croaking gut,
See how the half-star'd Frenchmen strut.
And call us English dogs:
But soon we'll teach these bragging foes
That beef and beer give heavier blows
Than soup and roasted frogs.
The priests, inflam'd with righteous hopes,
Prepare their axes, wheels, and ropes,
To bend the stiff-neck'd sinner;
But should they sink in coming over,
Old Nick may fish 'twixt France and Dover,
And catch a glorious dinner.
The scenes of all Mr. Hogarth's prints, except The Gate of Calais, and that now
under consideration, are laid in England. In this, having quitted his own country, he
seems to think himself out of the reach of the critics, and, in delineating a Frenchman,
at liberty to depart from nature, and sport in the fairy regions of caricature. Were
29.
In the two following designs, Mr. Hogarth has displayed that partiality for his own
country and contempt for France, which formed a strong trait in his character. He
neither forgot nor forgave the insults he suffered at Calais, though he did not recollect
that this treatment originated in his own ill humour, which threw a sombre shade over
every object that presented itself. Having early imbibed the vulgar prejudice that
one Englishman was a match for four Frenchmen, he thought it would be doing his
country a service to prove the position. How far it is either useful or politic to depre-
ciate the power, or degrade the character of that people with whom we. are to contend
is a question which does not come within the plan of this work. In some cases it may
create confidence, but in others lead to the indulgence of that negligent security by
which armies have been slaughtered, provinces depopulated, and kingdoms changed
their rulers.
PLATE I.
FRANCE.
With lantern jaws and croaking gut,
See how the half-star'd Frenchmen strut.
And call us English dogs:
But soon we'll teach these bragging foes
That beef and beer give heavier blows
Than soup and roasted frogs.
The priests, inflam'd with righteous hopes,
Prepare their axes, wheels, and ropes,
To bend the stiff-neck'd sinner;
But should they sink in coming over,
Old Nick may fish 'twixt France and Dover,
And catch a glorious dinner.
The scenes of all Mr. Hogarth's prints, except The Gate of Calais, and that now
under consideration, are laid in England. In this, having quitted his own country, he
seems to think himself out of the reach of the critics, and, in delineating a Frenchman,
at liberty to depart from nature, and sport in the fairy regions of caricature. Were
29.