A Rake's Progress: Plate 3

1735

12 1/2” X 15 5/16” (H X W)

Etched and Engraved by Hogarth after his painting.

View the full resolution plate here.

Tom has flung himself entirely into his work. Here we seen the rake in action, completely and uncompromisingly debauched. In his nineteenth-century commentary, Ireland relates the following poetic, yet fitting, description of the plate:

His blatantly phallic unsheathed sword provides another clue to his intentions. However, this seemingly obvious display of sexual abandon has been downplayed by Robert Cowley as "drunkenness with only an undercurrent of sexuality" (58). He also has "one stocking up and one down, a traditional sign of intoxication." Cowley does admit that "his curious, sprawling pose was a well-known metaphor of sexual intercourse in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries" but his focus remains on the alcoholic excess of the scene (58). Similarly, Derek Jarrett claims that Rakewell, "drunk and pawed by the harlots . . . looks the picture of misery" (England 192) in what I find to be a crucial misreading of Tom's clearly blissful expression in the plate. Rather, his sexual missteps are at the forefront here.

Tom's promiscuity is troubling to Hogarth, and that discomfort is evident here, as signs of disorder are featured prominently in the scene. Shesgreen notes the vandalism of the portraits of Augustus, Titus and other important leaders and the preservation of those of Nero and the like (134). This display of disrespect for authority in the Roman Empire more than hints at an impending danger to the English Empire as more stolidly moral leaders are shirked in favor of licentious ones. Ireland points out the woman in the back of the room with a candle to the world map, and, in typical dramatic style, laments that she is “determined to set the world on fire, though she parish in the conflagration!” (134). Thus, in this scene of alcoholic and sexual excess, the state of the -world" is of little concern to the revelers. The presence of this world map also lends a macrocosmic significance to the events here, a significance that will be underscored in the final scene.

Commentators have also noted that Rakewell's current conquest is not only fondling him but is also robbing him. His drunken lust allows him to relinquish self- mastery. He is motivated solely by appetite: reason no longer has its proper dominion and is given up as easily as his watch. Certainly, Rakewell’s head is no longer making his decisions. Rochester jokes about and warns of the possible political dangers of such conduct in "On King Charles":

Like Rochester's Charles, Hogarth's Rakewell is "swayed" by his desire. The perils of his actions are severe: power is usurped by women, wealth becomes tenuous; the world threatens to bum like Nero's Rome. Lichtenberg focuses on the watch that the prostitute lifts from Rakewell and passes to her accomplice, writing, "It is a well-known fact that if human beings no longer order their lives by following their clocks, then their clocks follow them. Disorder has this advantage" (219). Thus, he sees the watch's removal as a descent into confusion. Unbridled sexuality, as displayed here, threatens chaos, and the plate's own caption echoes this fear: "To enter in with covert Treason,/ O'erthrow the drowsy Guard of Reason,/ To ransack the abandon'd Place,/ And revel there with wild Excess?"

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3

Shesgreen, Sean. Engravings by Hogarth. (1973)

Plate II illustrates Tom’s morning entertainments; Plate III depicts his evening pleasures, exposing both Tom himself and the aristocratic model upon which he forms himself. He has ordered an extravagant orgy for himself and a single acquaintance. The affair takes place in a shabby room that may once have had pretensions to grandeur; the inscription on the large plate held by the servant with the infantile grin on his face reads “John Bonvine at the Rose Tavern Drury Lane.”

Tom and his companion seem to have played a substantial part in the pointless destruction that has been visited on the place. The backs of the chairs have been broken, the room’s mirror shattered and portraits of “Augustus,” “Titus,” “Otho,” “Vitelius,” and “Vespatianus” have been slashed. Only the portraits of “Nero” and “Pontac,” a person after whom a well-known London restaurant was named, have survived. Surrounded again by commercial people and besotted by alcohol but still drinking, the rake reclines close to a bed, his clothes unbuttoned, on the bosom of a solicitous harlot. With typical aristocratic disregard for the law, his unsheathed sword has been drawn in a cowardly attack upon an unarmed watchman. The watchman’s battered lantern and staff lie at the rake’s feet along with a broken glass, some scattered pills and part of a portrait of an emperor (“Iulius”). The innocent looking (and very sober) harlot fondles Tom as she passes his watch to an accomplice.

At the table an angry woman spews a stream of gin at another who threatens her with a knife. A mischief maker sets fire symbolically to a map of the world. Below her the rake’s drunken acquaintance and a stupefied harlot fondle mechanically. A very sober Black woman smiles at a half-conscious figure who spills the contents of a large punchbowl over herself in an attempt to consume it; she is restrained by a more delicate companion who drinks from a glass and bottle.

Behind them the “posture woman,” wearing stockings bearing an incongruous coronet, undresses sleepily. She will perform on the large dish in the center of the table with the candle as her prop. Her underclothes lie piled on top of an emperor’s face. Her index finger points to the stuck chicken although she herself does not seem to see the ragged ballad singer advertising the “Black Joke”: her pregnant, desolate state is a warning to the harlots about the hazards of their occupation. In the corner a trumpeter and harpist provide the music for the girl’s act. It is morning; daylight shines through the window and is reflected on the bottles on the table (30).

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3

Paulson, Ronald. Hogarth’s Graphic Works. (1965)

CAPTION:

From the rim of the large metal platter being carried into the room we learn that this is "John Bonvine at the Rose Tavern Drury Lane." The Rose Tavern was on the east side of Bridges Street at the corner of Russell Street; it was demolished in 1775-76 when the Drury Lane Theatre was enlarged. (See E. B. Chancellor, The Annals of Covent Garden and its Neighbourhood, London, n.d., pp. 64, 164-67.) The Rake's watch, being stolen by a whore, shows 3 o'clock. At the Rake's feet are a watchman's battered lantern and a watchman's staff bearing the arms of the City of London. He has been in a street brawl; his sword is thrust through the pendant part of his belt, implying that he has recently drawn it (probably against the watchman) and in his drunken state missed the scabbard when he returned it. Almost everything in the room is broken: mirror, wine glasses, dishes, chair, cane, even the fowl that lies at the posture woman's feet. Around the walls are, besides the broken mirror, a map of the "TOTUS MUNDUS," which a neglected girl is setting afire, and Titian's portraits of the Roman emperors. These, placed out of their natural order, are "AUGUSTUS," "NERO," "TITUS," "OTHO," "VITELIUS," and "VESPATIANUS." The heads of all but the most depraved of them, Nero, have been cut out. The seventh, unlabeled, has been recently mutilated—the face is still on the floor, at the Rake's feet, labeled "IULIUS." In the third state Julius Caesar's face remains on the floor, but his portrait has been replaced by one of "PONTAC," a fat man whose head is still in place. Pontac's was a French eating-house in Abchurch Lane, London; according to Defoe's Tour Thro' the Whole Island of Great Britain (1724, I, 175), it took its name from a president of the Parliament of Bordeaux "from whose name the best French clarets were called so." (See also Swift's letter to Stella, Aug. 11, 1711, in Journal to Stella, ed. H. Williams, Oxford, 1948, I, 334 and n.)

The waiter entering at the right with the platter is said to be "Leather Coat," porter at the Rose Tavern, famous for the strength of his ribs, who for a pot of beer would lie in the road and let a carriage wheel run over him (Gen. Works, 2, 119). Fielding had used the man, as Leathersides, in The Covent-Garden Tragedy (1732). With him is a street-singer, well along in pregnancy, holding in one hand an indecent ballad, "Black loke." The "posture woman," who is undressing in the foreground, performs on the platter Leather Coat is carrying. It is put on the table and she perches upon it naked, whirling and assuming various "postures." Concerning the candle Leather Coat also carries, Rouquet adds (p. 23), "il suffit de vous laisser à deviner la destination de la chandelle." A coronet embroidered on her stocking implies that it previously belonged to a countess (164-165).

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3

Uglow, Jenny. Hogarth: A Life and a World. (1997)

Tom’s bills, however, are catching up with him. In the scene in the Rose Tavern, he seems as impotent as the great castrato himself. He may have beaten some poor old watchman, whose lantern lies at his feet, but his sword hangs limply out of his scabbard. Even in this state he clings to marks of gentility, holding his glass just as the manuals of politeness decreed (the genteel held it by the stem, the uncouth by the bowl). In this polite world turned upside-down the dancing master of the salon is replaced by the brisk, preoccupied posture woman, stripping to pose and gyrate on the huge platter that the porter Leathercoat is bringing through the door, with the candle she snuffs out obscenely in her dance, a mockery of sex. Here, too, there was a joke for up-to-date art lovers—in Tom’s incapacitated, sprawling pose, with his legs at that curious angle, Hogarth took over a pose used by Watteau in his painting of Antoine de la Roque, an old soldier “disabled” by a wound at Malplaquet, resting on a bank with a satyr and a group of curious wood nymphs peering from the background. The print of this was engraved only in 1734, while Hogarth was already working on his paintings. It was very new, very French, very clever. And the jest was taken further by Hogarth’s placing of the posture woman’s corset, lying on the floor, notably similar in shape to Watteau’s soldier’s discarded breastplate.

In this libertine underside of the connoisseur’s world, all the “art” around Tom is debased—the portraits of Roman emperors are defaced (except for Nero), the mirror is smashed, the map of the world is set on fire by a careless girl’s candle. The music is no longer offered by Handel, but by a heavily pregnant street woman singing the lewd ballad “Black Jake” and by a trumpeter and harpist in the corner. The latter might remind Hogarth’s viewers of the moment in The Beggar’s Opera where Macheath, among his “free-hearted wenches”, not knowing that he is about to be betrayed with a kiss by Jenny Diver, calls for a song:

The scene, with its carpe diem air, is lively and noisy—by far the most vital in the whole story—and the energy of the women, even the quarrelling pair spitting gin, has a wonderful gutsy life. But there is a sinister undertone. Tom’s watch has been pinched by the girl behind (who looks suspiciously like Moll). Time is being snatched from him. The women’s patches spell disease, and the box of pills on the floor hints that Tom is already infected (249-253).

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3

Ireland, John and John Nichols. Hogarth’s Works. (1883)

This plate exhibits our licentious prodigal engaged in one of his midnight festivities: forgetful of the past, and negligent of the future, he riots in the present. Having poured his libation to Bacchus, he concluded the evening orgies in a sacrifice at eh Cyprian shrine; and, surrounded by the votaries of Venus, joins in the unhallowed mysteries of the place. The companions of his revelry are marked with that easy, unblushing effrontery which belongs to the servants of all work in the isle of Paphos;--for the maids of honour, they are not sufficiently elevated.

He may be supposed, in the phrase of the day, to have beat the rounds, overset a constable, and conquered a watchman, whose staff and lanthorn he has brought into the room as trophies of his prowess. In this situation he is robbed of his watch by the girl whose hand is in his bosom; and, with that adroitness peculiar to an old practitioner, she conveys her acquisition to an accomplice, who stands behind the chair.

Two of the ladies are quarrelling; and one of them delicately spouts wine in the face of her opponent, who is preparing to revenge the affront with a knife, which, in a posture of threatening defiance, she grasps in her hand. A third, enraged at being neglected, holds a lighted candle to a map of the globe, determined to set the world on fire though she perish in the conflagration! A fourth is undressing. The fellow bringing in a pewter dish (This is the portrait of one Leathercoat, many years a porter at Rose Tavern, and remarkable for his universal knowledge of women of the town.), as part of the apparatus of this elegant and attic entertainment, a blind-harper (Hogarth seems to have had a great fancy for bringing King David into bad company. He is in the second plate of “The Harlot’s Progress” depicted in the bed-room of a prostitute, and here represented as perched on harp, at a brothel in Drury Lane), a trumpeter, and a ragged ballad-singer roaring out an obscene song, completes this motley group.

This design may be a very exact representation of what ere then the nocturnal amusements of a brothel;--so different are the manners of the year 1805 from those of 1734, that I much question whether a similar exhibition is not to be seen in any tavern of the metropolis. That we are less licentious than our predecessors, I dare not affirm; but we are certainly more delicate in the pursuit of our pleasures.

The room is furnished with a set of Roman emperors,--they are not placed in their proper order; for in the mad revelry of the evening this family of frenzy have decollated all of them except Nero; and his manner had too great s similarity to their own to admit of his suffering so degrading an insult: their reverence for virtue induced them to spare his head. In the frame of a Cæsar they have placed the portrait of Pontac, an eminent cook, whose great talents being turned to heightening sensual rather than mental enjoyments, he has a much better chance of a votive offering from this company than would either Vespasian or Trajan.

The shattered mirror, broken wine-glasses, fractured chair and cane; the mangled fowl, with a fork stuck in its breast, thrown into a corner, and indeed every accompaniment, shows that this has been a night of riot without enjoyment, mischief without wit, and waste without gratification.

With respect to the drawing of the figures in this curious female coterie, Hogarth evidently intended several of them for beauties; and of vulgar, uneducated, prostituted beauty, he had a good idea. The hero of our tale displays all that careless jollity which copious draughts of maddening wine are calculated to inspire; he laughs the world away, and bids it pass. The poor dupe without his periwig, n this background, forms a good contrast of character: he is maudlin drunk, and sadly sick. To keep up the spirit of unity throughout the society, and not leave the poor African girl entirely neglected, she is making signs to her friend the porter, who perceives, and slightly returns, her love-inspiring glance. This print is rather crowded,--the subject demanded it should be so; some of the figures thrown into shade might have helped the general effect, but would have injured the characteristic expression (133-136).

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3

Quennell, Peter. Hogarth’s Progress. (1955)

Thus the scene now shifts to the Rose Tavern where, having fought and defeated a watchman whose broken lantern and staff lie tumbled at his feet, he and a friend are entertaining a party of prostitutes in a shabby upper room. Holman Hunt, more than a hundred years later, anxious to illustrate a demi-mondaine’s lodging and determined, like a true Pre-Raphaelite, to portray every detail from first-hand knowledge, made it point of honour to visit certain questionable establishments in the vicinity of St. John’s Wood, but did so with the utmost repugnance and after many scrupulous heart-searchings. The eighteenth century was less inhibited; Hogarth (we are assured by Nolleken’s biographer, John Thomas Smith) was, in the usual course of his existence, a “great frequenter of houses supported by libertines”, and perfectly familiar with the kind of tavern-room to which Rakewell and his type resorted. The third scene of The Rake’s Progress is, indeed, especially interesting because it assists in our study of the pictorial dramatist’s creative method. Not only did he incorporate a variety of portraits and numerous references to contemporary tastes and trends—often so slight or so cryptic that, at a glance, they may be scarcely noticeable—but he employed the rough notes that he had already committed to his sketch-books, reviving an incident, a characteristic gesture, the transitory expression of an unknown face.

Such a note he transferred to the scene at The Rose. According to the author of Nollekens and his Times, Hogarth and his crony, Francis Hayman the painter, had happened to find themselves among the nocturnal crowd at Moll King’s Coffee House. “They had not been in the brothel ten minutes”, before Hogarth whipped out his book to draw two women quarrelling. One of the contestants spat a stream of wine or gin right into her rival’s eye, a gesture of defiance “which so delighted the artist, that he exclaimed, ‘Frank, mind the bitch’s mouth!’”, and recorded that detail too in his rapid cursive shorthand. He remembered the detail when he came to deal with the Rake, here depicted as a limp and exhausted adventurer, washed up on the isle of Circe, his sword out of its sheath, shirt and breeches unbuttoned, his wig disheveled and his hat askew, being robbed by the young dark-haired girl across whose silken lap he is half reclining. Punch has been brewed; bottles have been opened. Meanwhile there are further diversions in store; for among the amusements provided by the Rose were exhibitions of the sort with which every well-organised brothel attempts to whet its customers’ appetite. Leather-coat is the master of ceremonies. Musicians have been recruited from the street; and he is holding the pewter dish that an habitué of Covent Garden would at once have recognised. The “posture woman” is undressing on the left, with the patient and practised movements of a mercenary who thoroughly understands her trade; and, as soon as she has stripped, she will mount on the platter, “to whirl herself round, and display other feats of indecent activity”. Rouquet, Hogarth’s Swiss-French commentator and near-neighbour in Leicester Fields, who, apparently at the artist’s instigation, produced an account of his for the benefit of the foreign public, supplies and illuminating postscript: “Ce grand plat va servir à cetter femme comme à une poularde; elle s’y placera sur le dos; et l’ivresse et l’esprit de débauche feront trouver plaisant un jeu, qui de sang-froad ne le paroit guères.” Leather-coat, doltish and obsequious, is also carrying a lighted candle “Il suffit de vous laisser à deviner la destination de la chandelle,” Rouquet observes with somewhat unnecessary minuteness.

Rouquet was almost equally interested by the national affluence that this scene revealed. The comfort and propriety of English taverns astonished foreign visitors; and, though the Rose is dingy and ramshackle, though the old pictures of the Twelve Cæsars have been gashed with knives or sword-blades, and one emperor has been replaced by a portrait of Pontac, the renowned book, from a foreign point of view, it is still remarkably well arranged: “du linge toujours blanc—de tables de bois qu’on appelle ici mahogany—grand feu et gratis” (129-131).

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3

Dobson, Austin. William Hogarth. (1907)

One of these exploits is depicted in Plate III. The Rake is discovered drunk in a tavern in Drury Lane at three in the morning, surrounded by the trophies of a street row, largely supplemented by further contributions from the apartment itself. His companions, mostly recruited from the nymphs of the neighbourhood, are in scarcely better case. One (like Prior’s “Kitty”) sets the world on fire (in a map). Another spits brandy in the face of her furious vis-à-vis, who threatens her with a knife. A harper is twanging mechanically at the door; a tattered beggar-wench creaks out the “Black Joke.” We omit the remaining details of the plate, which may be studied in full in Nichols and John Ireland. This is the rake’s zenith; in the next scene he enters upon the first stage of his decline (42).

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3

Paulson, Ronald. Hogarth: His Life, Art and Times. (1971)

In the Rake’s Progress (1735) the early scenes imply mythological analogues, the second plate connecting the Rake’s choice with Paris’ and the third a brothel scene with a Feast of the Gods or a Bacchanal; the final scene in Bedlam shows the Rake in the arms of Sarah Young, in the pose of a Pietà (vol.1 271).

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3

Lichtenberg, G. Ch. Lichtenberg’s Commentaries on Hogarth’s Engravings. (1784-1796). Translated from the German by Innes and Gustav Herdan (1966)

The greatest scientists, and in particular chemists, have held the view that man, and everything that draws breath and wishes to do so for an appreciable time, would do best to draw it from a mixture of one part life- giving and three parts death-giving air. This is very remarkable. For if a human being is put into the latter alone, he will no longer be good for anything—it would be all over with him. If, however, he is put into the former unadulterated, oh, then life blazes up with six-fold brilliance, his cheeks glow with youth, and his stomach digests with six-fold power, but the rate of consumption is very rapid, and if he goes on like that one grows apprehensive of—eternal life. How wise was it, therefore, of Heaven to mix with the air of life eternal in our atmosphere, a threefold portion of the air of death! Without that damper, most plants would probably, through all-too-rapid growth, yield more straw than corn on the harvest day. I believe, therefore, that a profound treatise on the Damper would be of immense advantage to our modern hot-house system of education. At present there is too much forcing-matter in it. How does Heaven rear us? If we consisted of soul only we should all shoot up as male and female bigots, who in the end would be of no use in either Earth or Heaven, but the well-known five dampers have the effect that the spirit grows somewhat slower, with the result that in the end it need not feel ashamed of being seen in either climate. But why all this? Why? I should think the application is clear enough. In the second Plate, Rakewell stood in a hot-house, and now here he sits under the influence of the damper. Today he has fought, danced—though only with the dancing master—has taken a piano lesson, another on the French horn, and another in the art of boxing. He has listened to a lecture and has dealt with a good amount of domestic business. So much work requires rest wherein the mind may gain time to brace itself again for the morning, and this he finds here; of course, in a somewhat curious way, but that is none of our business—it is a matter of taste. In former times there were men who sought recreation in this way from the most difficult of all occupations, that of government, and by this means regained their capacity for ministering to whole countries.

Here then the busy man takes his rest at an Inn. Whether it is a permanent brothel, or one created by himself ex tempore, I do not know. Nor does it matter; but the latter is more likely. With money one can make anything out of a room in London: library, picture-gallery, museum, or harem, and in less than no time. Rakewell here has chosen the last for himself and a friend. The composition is, as we see, of almost oriental proportions, that is, apart from the little toad with the ballad near the door, who evidently does not belong to it, ten females to two males, or more precisely now—two men. There must have been frightful goings-on, and that for a good long time, for the light which shines here cannot come from the four little flames in the background. Day has dawned and mirrors itself in the bottles, and that is very lucky for us, since without its help we should barely be able to distinguish half of the reign of terror which has held and still holds sway here. This Plate could serve as a warning to those who know country life only from pastoral poetry.

There he sits now, or rather the little which still remains of him; very little to be sure. Of the six senses which he brought with him, hardly a single one remains, and the traces of those not yet completely departed are no longer worthy of mention. His clothes hang loosely around him and on him, merely following the law of gravitation, just like his limbs. The left stocking has already reached the lowest point and with the least jerk the right will follow its example, and then no doubt the master him- self will follow suit. There is every indication that he has already had a slight conflict with the law of gravitation, in which the chair behind him had its back broken. What bliss there is in that face! The whole feeble residue of gesture-language which still hovers about those lips seems to have assembled merely to convey to the observer the indescribable joy of senselessness. At his side hangs his sword across its sheath, thus already in the position in which it is to lie over the corpse of our hero, in sign of honour, as soon as he has accomplished his own destruction.

We cannot possibly let him sink to rest like that without casting a glance at his actions, and this leads us to a closer investigation of the battlefield. Beside him on the floor lie the trophies of victory, the lantern of the night-watchman, more properly of the watch, together with his official quarter-staff, and this is as creditable as if the watch himself were to lie stretched out there. Figg's pupil has done well. In the immediate vicinity and almost under the point of the sword, apparently felled by it, lies the noblest object that could have fallen by the sword of a hero—Julius Caesar's head. A second Caesarian (sectio Caesarea) has here stretched the master of the world in the dust amidst broken glasses, clandestine pills, and horn-lantern fragments. Rakewell in his intoxication (and that is the best time for it) has hit upon the idea of restoring the Roman Republic and has attacked with his Jacobin the Imperial Zodiac of the first century who adorned the wall up there. The order of the zodiacal signs there is, as one sees, quite in conformity with the system of the place and its furniture and movables.

Sunt: Aries, Cancer, Virgo, Gemini, Leo, Taurus, etc. The tyrants are really beheaded, as far as one can see, with the exception of Nero; here was a boon companion, a perfect devil of a fellow, who had a head on his shoulders, and so he shall keep it there. As for the others, in place of the tiresome heads of office which they possessed, Hogarth seems to have endowed them with some giddier ones for private use. It looks as if the empty spaces were heads, or the other way round. That might often have chanced in Rome too. Augustus puts out quite a considerable piece of tongue, perhaps at the poor Republic; Vitellius (Hogarth writes Vitelius) by virtue of wig and ruff looks, on our copy at least, really respectable, and the honest Vespasian carries a pig's head. Did Hogarth take him perhaps for the destroyer of Jerusalem? In Caesar's place (and in the first copies of this Plate, it was really Caesar who hung there) a solid, stout man of the world has been inserted, who fills his place. With such a figure, the orbis terrarum surely has something on which to support itself. The man's name was Pontac, and he was, as Mr Ireland assures us, an eminent cook. A German would rather have taken him for a beer-brewer. Perhaps a lower Saxony Pontac-brewer. The anonymous interpreter does not quite know what to make of the paunch, but thinks he may have been an infamous brothel-keeper of the time. So maybe it is even the landlord of that Inn whom Rakewell has put in Caesar's place:

In an illustrated book of fairy tales it might also represent Clod I which Jupiter threw into a pond when he was asked to provide a King; upon this followed Stork I, Stork II, etc., about which Suetonius tells us more.

The mirror, the universal portrait of all present, is also slashed through; perhaps it was a suicide in effigie performed by Rakewell's sword. The larder has been relegated in haste and in the general tumult to the left- hand comer, which, as one sees, was already engaged. That sort of thing never does any good. Here, too, it has given rise to confusion. The first occupant, a pot which in general is treated with scant ceremony, and which itself very often does not stand on any at all, inexorably pours its whole abundance over roast chickens with the fork still in the breast, over torn off chicken legs, and plates and lemons and liqueur glasses, and remains master of the field. The master's Spanish cane lies broken with its strap beside it, and holds sway no longer. In the foreground lie female garments from the deepest layers (they have made themselves thoroughly comfortable here); they reach as far as the Emperors' heads, and past these to mingle with the vulgar pills; and so on. All the chairbacks within sight are broken.

This is a brief survey of the devastation of inanimate Nature. Now for a few glances at the plight of the living. Indolence and relaxation have here, as usual, something of the outward appearance of sobriety, and in the general arrangement of the bodies there is at least some picturesque system. A line drawn through the heads hovering round the table ascends gradually from right to left, and from the turning point of a shorn head descends again towards the left with equal inclination towards the horizon. Thus one returns more or less to the starting point. But this is the only sort of plan to be found here, and even this is merely consequent upon the shape of the table. Tables may well have such an effect; they arrange in an orderly way what would otherwise have defied arrangement, they enhance physical distance, and through their stiff neutrality offer protection to those who sit around them, whereas a few inches less wood might have led to murder and manslaughter. It is the same everywhere. One could demonstrate it with a geographical map.

The black-feathered hat of our hero is rather intimately approached by a white-feathered one. Of course, they are only hats. But the girl certainly had this rapprochement to thank for her victory over so many other sisters. Probably all goes into one kitty, but she was the one to achieve it. Rakewell loves feathered hats, and if one of these girls put one on, with a white feather versus his black feather, this surely means for anybody who can read: ‘I and Thou', and that is more than half the battle. With her right hand she feels for his heart, and thus for his pulse at its source. But the attack is a feint. The real attack was directed at another pulse, his watch, and that is safely delivered to the rear under the girl's watchful eye. The hands of the watch point to three o'clock. This, even in the height of summer, would be somewhat too early for so much light as blazes here, and which can have no other source but the day. But there is really no difficulty here. It is a well-known fact that if human beings no longer order their lives by following their clocks, then their clocks follow them. Disorder has this advantage, that one can explain everything by it. The composure with which the arrière-garde receives the spoils is marvellously expressed. Behind that face one would hardly suspect so much acquaintance with crime. With her elbow leaning on the chair-back of the vanquished she catches the watch with her right hand as if it were a soap-bubble, and before handing it over to the treasure-chest it amuses her to toy with it a little, and quite near Rakewell's ears at that. She must certainly have a good idea of how such ears in such heads work. That Hogarth must have been rather proud of that face can be seen from his use of contrast by which he has thrown it into relief. Here again are English milk-and-blood on a background of African pine-soot. How the little black Satan behind there is lit up! Hers are the liveliest eyes in the whole Plate. They are really directed towards the shiny dish near the door where a girl in the attitude of the trumpeter in the second Plate blares out a very indecent ballad, "The Black Joke”. The witch seems to find amusement in this song. Of course she too is black, and apart from that is fond of a joke, in any colour. She puts her finger to her mouth; probably she had intended to hide behind her whole hand as an expression of female modesty, but decided half-way that it would be unnecessary in this company.

In her immediate vicinity are two little female dragon-heads, one of whom is spitting fire, and the other foul wine. Up till now they had evidently been duelling with tongues only, or had had their pistols loaded merely with invectives; but now since all the linguistic ammunition has been used up, they have adopted more substantial weapons, the one a knife and the other a fire-extinguisher. Maybe the burning damsel had merely begged the extinguisher, the Nymph of the well, for a drink, of which she was in need; this the other is sending her in the form of a jet, while securing the well with both hands. A few inches less table-wood might have produced interesting results. Between that warlike pair, just where the pyramid of the group reaches its peak, is a rather peaceful couple. In the striking face of the girl even the fumes of wine can hardly obscure the faint glimmer of another fire. She seems to have the intention of ensnaring an indolent lap-dog fellow on her own account, and evidently with poor success. The scene lies outside the limit of our Plate. The two remaining figures at the table are very easy to understand. They represent the technical side of the art of drinking, upon the first rung of its ladder and upon the last. The one, quick and lively, still drinks with the left hand alone, holding the right, which is hanging down but not relaxed, with considerable dignity. She holds her glass with that well- known air of refinement in which the little finger is outstretched, as if one were taking a pinch of something. The other drinks in a state of exhaustion, grasping the overflowing vessel with both fists, and is at the end of her tether. The first reminds one of the Greek poet who imbibes soul-giving Chier and enthusiasm in strong draughts, but always with grace. The second, on the other hand, resembles one of our poets who puts the heavy bucket of his publisher's demands with hopeful flourish to his lips but, happily for his readers, empties half the heavy stout into his trousers.

In the background we see a girl engaged upon a significant procedure. In her hand she holds a light, and is evidently about to set fire to something, and that something is nothing less than the one-time property of the bright heads up there on the wall, the Orbis terrarum itself: TOTUS MUNDUS. That Hogarth has chosen a whore for that business is evidence of his great familiarity with ancient history and the earliest relics of lofty poetry. Perhaps there is more to it still. One of Hogarth's commentators made short work of it. He believes the girl had felt herself slighted by the company and in her rage she sets the world alight, despite the fact that she would thereby share the fate of all the others. What a joke to be sure, and what a gift for divining and sharing Hogarth's mood! Why not rather set fire straightaway to Mr Pontac's house by applying the light to the staircase? No! If that action is to have a meaning, as I believe it has, beyond the utterly senseless craving of the drunkard for destruction, in order to relieve his feelings, it must surely be a deeper one. Perhaps the following interpretation, if not the true one, is at least more commensurate with Hogarth's genius. Whoever intends to set fire to a map (of the countries themselves there is no question here), quite unallegorically, will begin in dubio, if the map is hanging on the wall, with the lower edge. This, however, is not what the poor girl is doing; indeed, she seems rather to be searching for some particular spot, employing some bodily exertion and probably standing on tiptoe. Now if I am not mistaken that spot is just in front of the East coast of America, whence, as is well known, the Spaniards brought a certain product to Europe with which girls of that type carry on a sort of smugglers' trade, up to this day. Therefore, what one might here take for inflammation, may it not be a mere illumination or search for the main storehouse, prompted by mercantile-geographical curiosity? Certainly not! There is no doubt that because she has become bankrupt in the trade she is setting fire to the world in effigie just on that spot where the former American Company first started a conflagration in natura and lit a fire which they now try to extinguish by Amalgamation. Hogarth accompanies this world-conflagration with a mischievous touch, partly concealed and thus deniable if need be, which is all the more dangerous for an interpreter. Behind the door there stands a blind harpist upon whose harp, funnily enough. King David, whom Hogarth enjoys bringing into bad company, is displayed also with a harp. Here he sits immediately in front of Nero, and one cannot avoid the suspicion, knowing something of Hogarth's roguery, that he has been placed just there to make music for the conflagration of the world, as did Nero for the burning of Rome.

The damsel who in the foreground there seems to be making her toilet is a rather notorious figure of that time, known as the posture-woman. Her name, so Trusler declares, was Aratine (or Aretine). She really is stripping. She is prepared to show her art, and for that purpose to let herself be served up at table in the guise of a chicken, with a fork in the breast, as a living dish. The dish which is being brought in over there at the door, and which the baboon who carries it illuminates so as to advertise the spectacle, is to be the revolving stage upon which she will per- form. This is really abominable. But would the human race be greatly benefited were it deprived of the faculty to descend sometimes like that below the beasts? That here and there, in the shadiest corners of great towns, vermin is generated which finds its amusement in such bestialities is much less to the disgrace of human nature than the verdict of the inner judge, who uncorruptly dwells in the breast of millions and condemns that vermin to eternal infamy, is to its honour. A certain Englishman, Mr Pawson, has edited Joe Miller's Jests with Greek notes, which is not a jot better than a Till Eulenspiegel with Hebrew ones. I always remind myself of that book when I am tempted to become too serious in these Commentaries. However, since I have already mentioned one Greek note, I cannot refrain from adding a second as balm for the trauma which Aretine's story may perhaps have inflicted upon some tender organ. Hers is a shameful story, it is true, but it is not only the desire of the assembled company to revolve the plucked chicken on its dish, it is the desire of the chicken itself to let itself be revolved. It glories in it, it lives by it, and through it can buy itself new feathers. But how if in little social circles in many a devoutly Christian provincial town, in rooms where perhaps in- stead of Pontac an 'Ecce Homo' looks down from the walls, the absent neighbour, nay even the absent friend herself, is deprived of every cover for her human weakness and is served up upon the coffee tray for the entertainment of the company, and is there displayed to the accompaniment of giggles from the ladies and pious humbugs, what about that?— Oh, at least take away the 'Ecce Homo' and hang up old Pontac!

Round the dish are the words: 'John Bonvine (bon Vin) at the Rose Tavern, Drurylane', whereby Street and Inn are identified wherein such orgies were celebrated in those days. The name Bonvin justifies our assumption about Pontac. The baboon is also a portrait of a notorious waiter at the Rose Inn, who was known by the name of Leather-coat. He must have distinguished himself considerably since already in 1732 Fielding had shown him on the stage in his Covent Garden Tragedy under the name of Leathersides. He is said to have had an incredible familiarity with this type of trade; whoever wished to acquire American products would be certain to obtain the best addresses through him. Rakewell is sure to have consulted him.

I do not quite understand what the servant on the stairs is bringing in on his dish, or why he is there at all, but he is certainly not put there for nothing. Does it mean that on the other floors there are similar goings-on at this early hour, or does it indicate that this room is perhaps in the basement and more properly is a so-called cellar? For as a rule food is carried from English kitchens upwards and not downwards.

Nichols rightly reminds us that these are no longer the morals of the present time. Perhaps the priests and the idols are still the same, and it is merely the liturgy which has changed, or perhaps we agree with Dr Johnson's very clever remark: ‘It is a good thing,' he says, ‘for our young people, if they want to be dissolute, to be so at least outside their own country; then when they return they may start a new life with a new character.' Rakewell does not seem to envisage anything like this; he only thought to himself: 'stay in the country and earn an honest living', or he is quite willing to settle down abroad. Where? That we shall discover.

Herr Riepenhausen has drawn this Plate in reverse, and in this I think he was right. Since Hogarth's engravings are mainly copies of larger pictures, he himself did not take the trouble, unless there was a special reason for it, to reverse them; and therefore many well-known places and streets in London often appear in quite the wrong direction. In our picture the light enters from the left as it should do, Rakewell's sword hangs on the proper side, although of course the sword-belt hangs here as if it had turned round. The spitfire grips the knife with her right hand, and the coat buttons of the man at the head of the group are also on the right. But had there been any carelessness here, the greatest loss, for the interpreter at least, would have been the East coast of America. For on the original engraving the girl lights up the Eastern Paniglobium, and thus the Old World. But this is also true. Only the inspection of the original painting can here decide (215-224).

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3: Rake

Tom has flung himself entirely into his work. Here we seen the rake in action, completely and uncompromisingly debauched. In his nineteenth-century commentary, Ireland relates the following poetic, yet fitting, description of the plate:

Having poured his libation to Bacchus, he concludes the evening orgies in a sacrifice at the Cyprian shrine; and surrounded by the votaries of Venus, joins in the unhallowed mysteries of the place (133).

His blatantly phallic unsheathed sword provides another clue to his intentions. However, this seemingly obvious display of sexual abandon has been downplayed by Robert Cowley as "drunkenness with only an undercurrent of sexuality" (58). He also has "one stocking up and one down, a traditional sign of intoxication" (58). Cowley does admit that "his curious, sprawling pose was a well-known metaphor of sexual intercourse in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries" but his focus remains on the alcoholic excess of the scene. Similarly, Derek Jarrett claims that Rakewell, "drunk and pawed by the harlots . . . looks the picture of misery" in what I find to be a crucial misreading of Tom's clearly blissful expression in the plate (England 192). Rather, his sexual missteps are at the forefront here.

Commentators have also noted that Rakewell's current conquest is not only fondling him but is also robbing him. His drunken lust allows him to relinquish self- mastery. He is motivated solely by appetite: reason no longer has its proper dominion and is given up as easily as his watch. Certainly, Rakewell’s head is no longer making his decisions. Rochester jokes about and warns of the possible political dangers of such conduct in "On King Charles":

Like Rochester's Charles, Hogarth's Rakewell is "swayed" by his desire. The perils of his actions are severe: power is usurped by women, wealth becomes tenuous; the world threatens to bum like Nero's Rome. Lichtenberg focuses on the watch that the prostitute lifts from Rakewell and passes to her accomplice, writing, "It is a well-known fact that if human beings no longer order their lives by following their clocks, then their clocks follow them. Disorder has this advantage" (219). Thus, he sees the watch's removal as a descent into confusion. Unbridled sexuality, as displayed here, threatens chaos, and the plate's own caption echoes this fear: "To enter in with covert Treason,/ O'erthrow the drowsy Guard of Reason,/ To ransack the abandon'd Place,/ And revel there with wild Excess?"

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3: Rake

Shesgreen

Plate II illustrates Tom’s morning entertainments; Plate III depicts his evening pleasures, exposing both Tom himself and the aristocratic model upon which he forms himself. He has ordered an extravagant orgy for himself and a single acquaintance. The affair takes place in a shabby room that may once have had pretensions to grandeur; the inscription on the large plate held by the servant with the infantile grin on his face reads “John Bonvine at the Rose Tavern Drury Lane.”

Surrounded again by commercial people and besotted by alcohol but still drinking, the rake reclines close to a bed, his clothes unbuttoned, on the bosom of a solicitous harlot. With typical aristocratic disregard for the law, his unsheathed sword has been drawn in a cowardly attack upon an unarmed watchman. The watchman’s battered lantern and staff lie at the rake’s feet along with a broken glass, some scattered pills and part of a portrait of an emperor (“Iulius”). The innocent looking (and very sober) harlot fondles Tom as she passes his watch to an accomplice (30).

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3: Rake

Paulson, Hogarth's Graphic Works

The Rake's watch, being stolen by a whore, shows 3 o'clock. At the Rake's feet are a watchman's battered lantern and a watchman's staff bearing the arms of the City of London. He has been in a street brawl; his sword is thrust through the pendant part of his belt, implying that he has recently drawn it (probably against the watchman) and in his drunken state missed the scabbard when he returned it (164).

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3: Rake

Uglow

Tom’s bills, however, are catching up with him. In the scene in the Rose Tavern, he seems as impotent as the great castrato himself. He may have beaten some poor old watchman, whose lantern lies at his feet, but his sword hangs limply out of his scabbard. Even in this state he clings to marks of gentility, holding his glass just as the manuals of politeness decreed (the genteel held it by the stem, the uncouth by the bowl) (249).

in Tom’s incapacitated, sprawling pose, with his legs at that curious angle, Hogarth took over a pose used by Watteau in his painting of Antoine de la Roque, an old soldier “disabled” by a wound at Malplaquet, resting on a bank with a satyr and a group of curious wood nymphs peering from the background. The print of this was engraved only in 1734, while Hogarth was already working on his paintings (249-250).

Tom’s watch has been pinched by the girl behind (who looks suspiciously like Moll). Time is being snatched from him. The women’s patches spell disease, and the box of pills on the floor hints that Tom is already infected (252-253).

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3: Rake

Ireland

This plate exhibits our licentious prodigal engaged in one of his midnight festivities: forgetful of the past, and negligent of the future, he riots in the present. Having poured his libation to Bacchus, he concluded the evening orgies in a sacrifice at eh Cyprian shrine; and, surrounded by the votaries of Venus, joins in the unhallowed mysteries of the place. The companions of his revelry are marked with that easy, unblushing effrontery which belongs to the servants of all work in the isle of Paphos;--for the maids of honour, they are not sufficiently elevated.

He may be supposed, in the phrase of the day, to have beat the rounds, overset a constable, and conquered a watchman, whose staff and lanthorn he has brought into the room as trophies of his prowess. In this situation he is robbed of his watch by the girl whose hand is in his bosom; and, with that adroitness peculiar to an old practitioner, she conveys her acquisition to an accomplice, who stands behind the chair (133).

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3: Rake

Quennell

Thus the scene now shifts to the Rose Tavern where, having fought and defeated a watchman whose broken lantern and staff lie tumbled at his feet, he and a friend are entertaining a party of prostitutes in a shabby upper room (129).

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3: Rake

Dobson

One of these exploits is depicted in Plate III. The Rake is discovered drunk in a tavern in Drury Lane at three in the morning, surrounded by the trophies of a street row, largely supplemented by further contributions from the apartment itself. His companions, mostly recruited from the nymphs of the neighbourhood, are in scarcely better case (42).

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3: Rake

Lichtenberg

Here then the busy man takes his rest at an Inn. Whether it is a permanent brothel, or one created by himself ex tempore, I do not know. Nor does it matter; but the latter is more likely. With money one can make anything out of a room in London: library, picture-gallery, museum, or harem, and in less than no time. Rakewell here has chosen the last for himself and a friend. The composition is, as we see, of almost oriental proportions, that is, apart from the little toad with the ballad near the door, who evidently does not belong to it, ten females to two males, or more precisely now—two men. There must have been frightful goings-on, and that for a good long time, for the light which shines here cannot come from the four little flames in the background. Day has dawned and mirrors itself in the bottles, and that is very lucky for us, since without its help we should barely be able to distinguish half of the reign of terror which has held and still holds sway here. This Plate could serve as a warning to those who know country life only from pastoral poetry.

There he sits now, or rather the little which still remains of him; very little to be sure. Of the six senses which he brought with him, hardly a single one remains, and the traces of those not yet completely departed are no longer worthy of mention. His clothes hang loosely around him and on him, merely following the law of gravitation, just like his limbs. The left stocking has already reached the lowest point and with the least jerk the right will follow its example, and then no doubt the master him- self will follow suit. There is every indication that he has already had a slight conflict with the law of gravitation, in which the chair behind him had its back broken. What bliss there is in that face! The whole feeble residue of gesture-language which still hovers about those lips seems to have assembled merely to convey to the observer the indescribable joy of senselessness. At his side hangs his sword across its sheath, thus already in the position in which it is to lie over the corpse of our hero, in sign of honour, as soon as he has accomplished his own destruction.

We cannot possibly let him sink to rest like that without casting a glance at his actions, and this leads us to a closer investigation of the battlefield. Beside him on the floor lie the trophies of victory, the lantern of the night-watchman, more properly of the watch, together with his official quarter-staff, and this is as creditable as if the watch himself were to lie stretched out there. Figg's pupil has done well. In the immediate vicinity and almost under the point of the sword, apparently felled by it, lies the noblest object that could have fallen by the sword of a hero—Julius Caesar's head. A second Caesarian (sectio Caesarea) has here stretched the master of the world in the dust amidst broken glasses, clandestine pills, and horn-lantern fragments. Rakewell in his intoxication (and that is the best time for it) has hit upon the idea of restoring the Roman Republic and has attacked with his Jacobin the Imperial Zodiac of the first century who adorned the wall up there. The order of the zodiacal signs there is, as one sees, quite in conformity with the system of the place and its furniture and movables.

The black-feathered hat of our hero is rather intimately approached by a white-feathered one. Of course, they are only hats. But the girl certainly had this rapprochement to thank for her victory over so many other sisters. Probably all goes into one kitty, but she was the one to achieve it. Rakewell loves feathered hats, and if one of these girls put one on, with a white feather versus his black feather, this surely means for anybody who can read: ‘I and Thou', and that is more than half the battle. With her right hand she feels for his heart, and thus for his pulse at its source. But the attack is a feint. The real attack was directed at another pulse, his watch, and that is safely delivered to the rear under the girl's watchful eye. The hands of the watch point to three o'clock. This, even in the height of summer, would be somewhat too early for so much light as blazes here, and which can have no other source but the day. But there is really no difficulty here. It is a well-known fact that if human beings no longer order their lives by following their clocks, then their clocks follow them. Disorder has this advantage, that one can explain everything by it. The composure with which the arrière-garde receives the spoils is marvellously expressed. Behind that face one would hardly suspect so much acquaintance with crime. With her elbow leaning on the chair-back of the vanquished she catches the watch with her right hand as if it were a soap-bubble, and before handing it over to the treasure-chest it amuses her to toy with it a little, and quite near Rakewell's ears at that. She must certainly have a good idea of how such ears in such heads work (216-219).

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3: Gin Spitting

Women are not immune from the debauchery here, and one such creature spits gin at another.

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3: Gin Spitting

Shesgreen

At the table an angry woman spews a stream of gin at another who threatens her with a knife (30).

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3: Gin Spitting

Uglow

The scene, with its carpe diem air, is lively and noisy—by far the most vital in the whole story—and the energy of the women, even the quarrelling pair spitting gin, has a wonderful gutsy life (252).

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3: Gin Spitting

Ireland

Two of the ladies are quarrelling; and one of them delicately spouts wine in the face of her opponent, who is preparing to revenge the affront with a knife, which, in a posture of threatening defiance, she grasps in her hand (133-134).

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3: Gin Spitting

Quennell

Such a note he transferred to the scene at The Rose. According to the author of Nollekens and his Times, Hogarth and his crony, Francis Hayman the painter, had happened to find themselves among the nocturnal crowd at Moll King’s Coffee House. “They had not been in the brothel ten minutes”, before Hogarth whipped out his book to draw two women quarrelling. One of the contestants spat a stream of wine or gin right into her rival’s eye, a gesture of defiance “which so delighted the artist, that he exclaimed, ‘Frank, mind the bitch’s mouth!’”, and recorded that detail too in his rapid cursive shorthand. He remembered the detail when he came to deal with the Rake, here depicted as a limp and exhausted adventurer, washed up on the isle of Circe, his sword out of its sheath, shirt and breeches unbuttoned, his wig disheveled and his hat askew, being robbed by the young dark-haired girl across whose silken lap he is half reclining. Punch has been brewed; bottles have been opened. Meanwhile there are further diversions in store; for among the amusements provided by the Rose were exhibitions of the sort with which every well-organised brothel attempts to whet its customers’ appetite. Leather-coat is the master of ceremonies. Musicians have been recruited from the street; and he is holding the pewter dish that an habitué of Covent Garden would at once have recognised. The “posture woman” is undressing on the left, with the patient and practised movements of a mercenary who thoroughly understands her trade; and, as soon as she has stripped, she will mount on the platter, “to whirl herself round, and display other feats of indecent activity”. Rouquet, Hogarth’s Swiss-French commentator and near-neighbour in Leicester Fields, who, apparently at the artist’s instigation, produced an account of his for the benefit of the foreign public, supplies and illuminating postscript: “Ce grand plat va servir à cetter femme comme à une poularde; elle s’y placera sur le dos; et l’ivresse et l’esprit de débauche feront trouver plaisant un jeu, qui de sang-froad ne le paroit guères.” Leather-coat, doltish and obsequious, is also carrying a lighted candle “Il suffit de vous laisser à deviner la destination de la chandelle,” Rouquet observes with somewhat unnecessary minuteness (130-131).

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3: Gin Spitting

Lichtenberg

In her immediate vicinity are two little female dragon-heads, one of whom is spitting fire, and the other foul wine. Up till now they had evidently been duelling with tongues only, or had had their pistols loaded merely with invectives; but now since all the linguistic ammunition has been used up, they have adopted more substantial weapons, the one a knife and the other a fire-extinguisher. Maybe the burning damsel had merely begged the extinguisher, the Nymph of the well, for a drink, of which she was in need; this the other is sending her in the form of a jet, while securing the well with both hands. A few inches less table-wood might have produced interesting results. Between that warlike pair, just where the pyramid of the group reaches its peak, is a rather peaceful couple. In the striking face of the girl even the fumes of wine can hardly obscure the faint glimmer of another fire. She seems to have the intention of ensnaring an indolent lap-dog fellow on her own account, and evidently with poor success. The scene lies outside the limit of our Plate. The two remaining figures at the table are very easy to understand. They represent the technical side of the art of drinking, upon the first rung of its ladder and upon the last. The one, quick and lively, still drinks with the left hand alone, holding the right, which is hanging down but not relaxed, with considerable dignity. She holds her glass with that well- known air of refinement in which the little finger is outstretched, as if one were taking a pinch of something. The other drinks in a state of exhaustion, grasping the overflowing vessel with both fists, and is at the end of her tether. The first reminds one of the Greek poet who imbibes soul-giving Chier and enthusiasm in strong draughts, but always with grace. The second, on the other hand, resembles one of our poets who puts the heavy bucket of his publisher's demands with hopeful flourish to his lips but, happily for his readers, empties half the heavy stout into his trousers (220-221).

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3: Plate

A plate is being brought in for the “posture woman” to use in her libidinous dance.

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3: Plate

Paulson, Hogarth's Graphic Works

From the rim of the large metal platter being carried into the room we learn that this is "John Bonvine at the Rose Tavern Drury Lane."

The waiter entering at the right with the platter is said to be "Leather Coat," porter at the Rose Tavern, famous for the strength of his ribs, who for a pot of beer would lie in the road and let a carriage wheel run over him (Gen. Works, 2, 119). Fielding had used the man, as Leathersides, in The Covent-Garden Tragedy (1732). With him is a street-singer, well along in pregnancy, holding in one hand an indecent ballad, "Black loke" (164-165).

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3: Pontac

Caesar’s portrait has been replaced by that of Pontac, a cook. Hedonism and gluttony are the idols here.

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3: Pontac

Shesgreen

The backs of the chairs have been broken, the room’s mirror shattered and portraits of “Augustus,” “Titus,” “Otho,” “Vitelius,” and “Vespatianus” have been slashed. Only the portraits of “Nero” and “Pontac,” a person after whom a well-known London restaurant was named, have survived (30).

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3: Pontac

Paulson, Hogarth's Graphic Works

Around the walls are, besides the broken mirror, a map of the "TOTUS MUNDUS," which a neglected girl is setting afire, and Titian's portraits of the Roman emperors. These, placed out of their natural order, are "AUGUSTUS," "NERO," "TITUS," "OTHO," "VITELIUS," and "VESPATIANUS." The heads of all but the most depraved of them, Nero, have been cut out. The seventh, unlabeled, has been recently mutilated—the face is still on the floor, at the Rake's feet, labeled "IULIUS." In the third state Julius Caesar's face remains on the floor, but his portrait has been replaced by one of "PONTAC," a fat man whose head is still in place. Pontac's was a French eating-house in Abchurch Lane, London; according to Defoe's Tour Thro' the Whole Island of Great Britain (1724, I, 175), it took its name from a president of the Parliament of Bordeaux "from whose name the best French clarets were called so." (See also Swift's letter to Stella, Aug. 11, 1711, in Journal to Stella, ed. H. Williams, Oxford, 1948, I, 334 and n.) (164).

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3: Pontac

Ireland

The room is furnished with a set of Roman emperors,--they are not placed in their proper order; for in the mad revelry of the evening this family of frenzy have decollated all of them except Nero; and his manner had too great s similarity to their own to admit of his suffering so degrading an insult: their reverence for virtue induced them to spare his head. In the frame of a Cæsar they have placed the portrait of Pontac, an eminent cook, whose great talents being turned to heightening sensual rather than mental enjoyments, he has a much better chance of a votive offering from this company than would either Vespasian or Trajan (134-135).

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3: Pontac

Quennell

The comfort and propriety of English taverns astonished foreign visitors; and, though the Rose is dingy and ramshackle, though the old pictures of the Twelve Cæsars have been gashed with knives or sword-blades, and one emperor has been replaced by a portrait of Pontac, the renowned book, from a foreign point of view, it is still remarkably well arranged: “du linge toujours blanc—de tables de bois qu’on appelle ici mahogany—grand feu et gratis” (131).

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3: Pontac

Lichtenberg

Sunt: Aries, Cancer, Virgo, Gemini, Leo, Taurus, etc. The tyrants are really beheaded, as far as one can see, with the exception of Nero; here was a boon companion, a perfect devil of a fellow, who had a head on his shoulders, and so he shall keep it there. As for the others, in place of the tiresome heads of office which they possessed, Hogarth seems to have endowed them with some giddier ones for private use. It looks as if the empty spaces were heads, or the other way round. That might often have chanced in Rome too. Augustus puts out quite a considerable piece of tongue, perhaps at the poor Republic; Vitellius (Hogarth writes Vitelius) by virtue of wig and ruff looks, on our copy at least, really respectable, and the honest Vespasian carries a pig's head. Did Hogarth take him perhaps for the destroyer of Jerusalem? In Caesar's place (and in the first copies of this Plate, it was really Caesar who hung there) a solid, stout man of the world has been inserted, who fills his place. With such a figure, the orbis terrarum surely has something on which to support itself. The man's name was Pontac, and he was, as Mr Ireland assures us, an eminent cook. A German would rather have taken him for a beer-brewer. Perhaps a lower Saxony Pontac-brewer. The anonymous interpreter does not quite know what to make of the paunch, but thinks he may have been an infamous brothel-keeper of the time. So maybe it is even the landlord of that Inn whom Rakewell has put in Caesar's place:

In an illustrated book of fairy tales it might also represent Clod I which Jupiter threw into a pond when he was asked to provide a King; upon this followed Stork I, Stork II, etc., about which Suetonius tells us more (217-218).

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3: Posture Woman

Much as Tom assumes the posture of the decadent aristocrat, this “posture woman” will assume various poses on a plate.

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3: Posture Woman

Shesgreen

Behind them the “posture woman,” wearing stockings bearing an incongruous coronet, undresses sleepily. She will perform on the large dish in the center of the table with the candle as her prop. Her underclothes lie piled on top of an emperor’s face. Her index finger points to the stuck chicken although she herself does not seem to see the ragged ballad singer advertising the “Black Joke”: her pregnant, desolate state is a warning to the harlots about the hazards of their occupation. In the corner a trumpeter and harpist provide the music for the girl’s act. It is morning; daylight shines through the window and is reflected on the bottles on the table (30).

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3: Posture Woman

Paulson, Hogarth's Graphic Works

The "posture woman," who is undressing in the foreground, performs on the platter Leather Coat is carrying. It is put on the table and she perches upon it naked, whirling and assuming various "postures" (165).

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3: Posture Woman

Uglow

In this polite world turned upside-down the dancing master of the salon is replaced by the brisk, preoccupied posture woman,stripping to pose and gyrate on the huge platter that the porter Leathercoat is bringing through the door, with the candle she snuffs out obscenely in her dance, a mockery of sex (249).

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3: Posture Woman

Lichtenberg

The damsel who in the foreground there seems to be making her toilet is a rather notorious figure of that time, known as the posture-woman. Her name, so Trusler declares, was Aratine (or Aretine). She really is stripping. She is prepared to show her art, and for that purpose to let herself be served up at table in the guise of a chicken, with a fork in the breast, as a living dish. The dish which is being brought in over there at the door, and which the baboon who carries it illuminates so as to advertise the spectacle, is to be the revolving stage upon which she will per- form. This is really abominable. But would the human race be greatly benefited were it deprived of the faculty to descend sometimes like that below the beasts? That here and there, in the shadiest corners of great towns, vermin is generated which finds its amusement in such bestialities is much less to the disgrace of human nature than the verdict of the inner judge, who uncorruptly dwells in the breast of millions and condemns that vermin to eternal infamy, is to its honour. A certain Englishman, Mr Pawson, has edited Joe Miller's Jests with Greek notes, which is not a jot better than a Till Eulenspiegel with Hebrew ones. I always remind myself of that book when I am tempted to become too serious in these Commentaries. However, since I have already mentioned one Greek note, I cannot refrain from adding a second as balm for the trauma which Aretine's story may perhaps have inflicted upon some tender organ. Hers is a shameful story, it is true, but it is not only the desire of the assembled company to revolve the plucked chicken on its dish, it is the desire of the chicken itself to let itself be revolved. It glories in it, it lives by it, and through it can buy itself new feathers. But how if in little social circles in many a devoutly Christian provincial town, in rooms where perhaps in- stead of Pontac an 'Ecce Homo' looks down from the walls, the absent neighbour, nay even the absent friend herself, is deprived of every cover for her human weakness and is served up upon the coffee tray for the entertainment of the company, and is there displayed to the accompaniment of giggles from the ladies and pious humbugs, what about that?— Oh, at least take away the 'Ecce Homo' and hang up old Pontac! (222-223).

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3: Map

Ireland points out the woman in the back of the room with a candle to the world map, and, in typical dramatic style, laments that she is “determined to set the world on fire, though she parish in the conflagration!” (134). Thus, in this scene of alcoholic and sexual excess, the state of the -world" is of little concern to the revelers. The presence of this world map also lends a macrocosmic significance to the events here, a significance that will be underscored in the final scene.

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3: Map

Shesgreen

A mischief maker sets fire symbolically to a map of the world (30).

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3: Map

Uglow

the map of the world is set on fire by a careless girl’s candle (250).

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3: Map

Ireland

A third, enraged at being neglected, holds a lighted candle to a map of the globe, determined to set the world on fire though she perish in the conflagration! (134).

A Rake's Progress: Plate 3: Map

Lichtenberg

In the background we see a girl engaged upon a significant procedure. In her hand she holds a light, and is evidently about to set fire to something, and that something is nothing less than the one-time property of the bright heads up there on the wall, the Orbis terrarum itself: TOTUS MUNDUS. That Hogarth has chosen a whore for that business is evidence of his great familiarity with ancient history and the earliest relics of lofty poetry. Perhaps there is more to it still. One of Hogarth's commentators made short work of it. He believes the girl had felt herself slighted by the company and in her rage she sets the world alight, despite the fact that she would thereby share the fate of all the others. What a joke to be sure, and what a gift for divining and sharing Hogarth's mood! Why not rather set fire straightaway to Mr Pontac's house by applying the light to the staircase? No! If that action is to have a meaning, as I believe it has, beyond the utterly senseless craving of the drunkard for destruction, in order to relieve his feelings, it must surely be a deeper one. Perhaps the following interpretation, if not the true one, is at least more commensurate with Hogarth's genius. Whoever intends to set fire to a map (of the countries themselves there is no question here), quite unallegorically, will begin in dubio, if the map is hanging on the wall, with the lower edge. This, however, is not what the poor girl is doing; indeed, she seems rather to be searching for some particular spot, employing some bodily exertion and probably standing on tiptoe. Now if I am not mistaken that spot is just in front of the East coast of America, whence, as is well known, the Spaniards brought a certain product to Europe with which girls of that type carry on a sort of smugglers' trade, up to this day. Therefore, what one might here take for inflammation, may it not be a mere illumination or search for the main storehouse, prompted by mercantile-geographical curiosity? Certainly not! There is no doubt that because she has become bankrupt in the trade she is setting fire to the world in effigie just on that spot where the former American Company first started a conflagration in natura and lit a fire which they now try to extinguish by Amalgamation. Hogarth accompanies this world-conflagration with a mischievous touch, partly concealed and thus deniable if need be, which is all the more dangerous for an interpreter. Behind the door there stands a blind harpist upon whose harp, funnily enough. King David, whom Hogarth enjoys bringing into bad company, is displayed also with a harp. Here he sits immediately in front of Nero, and one cannot avoid the suspicion, knowing something of Hogarth's roguery, that he has been placed just there to make music for the conflagration of the world, as did Nero for the burning of Rome (221-222).