The Symptoms of Restiveness are of a somewhat marked and unmistakable character: while one sportsman's steed is kneeling down on his forelegs, and turning the huntsman heels over head, another cavalier's animal is standing rigidly on his forelegs, and perseveringly attempting to dislodge his mount by kicking out wildly behind. A third rider is no less fortunate in his hack, which has 'no mouth,' and is moreover a 'bolter'; the animal is steadily plunging through everything in its way, apparently unconscious of the desperate efforts his master is making to hold him in. An old woman, with her barrow and its contents, are tumbled over, without attracting the attention of the wrong-headed brute, whose mind is absorbed in his own private speculations.
1807 (?) _A Calf's Pluck._ Designed by H. Bunbury. Etched by T. Rowlandson.
1807 (?) _Rusty Bacon._ Designed by H. Bunbury. Etched by T. Rowlandson.
Whoe'er has travell'd life's dull round, Through all its various paths hath been, Must oft have wondered to have found His warmest welcome at an Inn.
A clerical traveller has arrived, late at night, at an hostel; a pretty chamber-maid is showing the reverend visitor to his room, bearing a lighted candle, a warming-pan, and the saddle-bags of the guest, who appears well pleased with his conductress, and is imparting his admiration. As it appears that this gentleman is inclined to be less respectable than his venerated calling should suggest, it is less scandalising to observe that various practical jokes of a rough character are besetting his path; consequently, it is highly probable that he will receive an active moral lesson before he reaches his chamber.
_November 9, 1807._ _Thomas Simmons, drawn from Life by Mr. Angelo._ Published by T. Rowlandson, 1 James Street, Adelphi. 'The horrid and inhuman murderer of Mrs. Hammerstone and Mrs. Warner at the house of Mr. Boreham, a Quaker at Hoddesdon, in Herts, on Tuesday evening, October 20, 1807.'--The barbarous murderer does not rejoice in a very formidable exterior. His weakly person has been sketched by the hand of Henry Angelo, the well-known fencing-master, a firm friend of Rowlandson through life. His amusing _Memoirs_ have supplied us with many circumstances relating to the caricaturist. It appears that Angelo, Bannister, and Rowlandson were schoolfellows at an early period of life, and they were all as youths excessively fond of their pencils; although it was reserved for Rowlandson alone to attain proficiency in the fine arts. Angelo, like George Selwyn, Colonel Hanger, and some few notorieties, was fond of attending executions, visiting jails, and similar lugubrious exhibitions. Among his visits to prisons he encountered some curious characters. Thomas Simmons, the subject of the present plate, was one of the unfortunates with whom he became acquainted on one of these eccentric excursions.