Note 3 — CATALOGUE OF HOGARTH'S PRINTS.[1] (continued 2)

In the third plate of this work, the figure of the female unclasping a penknife, is said to have been designed for the once celebrated Betty Careless. This remark is supposed to be countenanced by the initials E. C. on her bosom. From being in a state to receive company, this woman had been long reduced to show it, and, after repeated confinements in various prisons, was buried from the poor's house of St. Paul, Covent Garden, April 22, 1752, about seven years after this set of prints had been published. Such a representation of her decline from beauty, as may be given in the plate before us, is justified by various passages in Loveling's poems, Latin and English, written about the year 1738, and published in 1741. Thus in his ode, "Ad Sextum,"

Carlesis turpis macies decentem Occupat vultum——

Again more amply in his Elegiac Epistle, "Ad Henricum:"

Nympha Coventini quæ gloria sulferat Horti, Cui vix vidisset Druria vestra parem, Exul, inops, liquit proprios miseranda Penates, Fortunæ extremas sustinuitque vices, Nunc trahit infaustam tenebroso in carcere vitam, Et levat insolito mollia membra toro. Carlesis, ah! quantum, quantum mutaris ab illâ, Carlese, quæ Veneris maxima cura fuit! Æde tua risêre olim Charitesque Jocique, Hic fuerant Paphiæ currus & arma Deæ; Arsèrunt Cives, arsit Judæus Apella, Et te Bellorum deperiêre chori. Jam sordes, pallensque genas, & flaccida mammas, Non oculi, quondam qui micuere, micant. Heu! ubi formosæ referentes lilia malæ! Labra ubi purpureis quæ rubuére rosis! Te puer Idalius, te fastiditque juventus Tam marcescentem, dissimilemque tui. Siccine tam fidam curas Erycina ministram? Hæccine militiæ praemia digna tuæ? O Venus! ô nimium, nimiumque oblita tuarum! Carlesis an meruit sortis acerba pati? Quæ posthàc arisve tuis imponet honorem, Ardebit posthàc vel tua castra sequi? Omnigenas æquo circumspice lumine mœchas Quas tua pellicibus Druria dives alit, Quæ cellas habitant, vicos peditesve peragrant, Aut quæ Wappinios incoluêre lares; Invenienda fuit nusquam lascivior, artus Mobilior, sacris vel magis apta tuis. Carlesis ah nostris & flenda & fleta Camœnis! Accedat vestris nulla medela malis? Te vereor miseram fortuna tenaciter anget, Nec veniet rebus mollior aura tuis.

Again in his Ode, "Ad Carolum B......."

-----------------relinquent Carlesis quondam miseræ Penates Douglasa & Johnson, duo pervicacis Fulmina linguæ.

Again in a "Copy of Verses on Betty Close's coming to Town, &c."

Roberts will curse all whores— From worn-out Careless to fair Kitty Walker.

Again in an Ode intituled "Meretrices Britannicæ."

Alma scortorum Druriæque custos Orta Neptuno! tibi cura pulchræ; Carlesis satis data, tu secundà Carlesis regnes.

These lines will serve to enforce the moral of The Harlot's Progress, while they aim at the illustration of a single circumstance in Marriage à la Mode; where if this female is introduced at all, it seems to be in the character of an opulent procuress, either threatening the peer for having diseased her favourite girl, or preparing to revenge herself on the quack whose medicines had failed to eradicate his lordship's disorder. That heroine must have been notorious, who could at once engage the pencil of Hogarth and the pens of Loveling and Fielding, who in the sixth chapter of the first book of Amelia has the following story: "I happened in my youth to sit behind two ladies in a side-box at a play, where, in the balcony on the opposite side was placed the inimitable Betty Careless, in company with a young fellow of no very formal, or indeed sober, appearance. One of the ladies, I remember, said to the other—'Did you ever see any thing look so modest and so innocent as that girl over the way? What pity it is such a creature should be in the way of ruin, as I am afraid she is, by her being alone with that young fellow!' Now this lady was no bad physiognomist; for it was impossible to conceive a greater appearance of modesty, innocence, and simplicity, than what nature had displayed in the countenance of that girl; and yet, all appearances notwithstanding, I myself (remember, critic, it was in my youth) had a few mornings before seen that very identical picture of those engaging qualities in bed with a rake at a bagnio, smoaking tobacco, drinking punch, talking obscenity, and swearing and cursing with all the impudence and impiety of the lowest and most abandoned trull of a soldier." We may add, that one of the mad-men in the last plate of The Rake's Progress has likewise written "charming Betty Careless" on the rail of the stairs, and wears her portrait round his neck. Perhaps between the publication of The Rake's Progress and Marriage à la Mode, she sunk from a wanton into a bawd. Mrs. Heywood's Betsey Thoughtless was at first entitled Betsey Careless, but the name was afterwards changed for obvious reasons.

The London Daily Post, Nov. 28, 1735, contains the following advertisement from this notorious female:

"Mrs. Careless, from the Piazza in Covent-Garden, not being able to make an end of her affairs so soon as she expected, intends on Monday next to open a coffee-house in Prujean's-Court, in The Old Bailey, where she hopes her friends will favour her with their company, notwithstanding the ill situation of the place; since her misfortunes oblige her still to remain there.

"N. B. It is the uppermost house in the court, and coaches and chairs may come up to the door."

Again in The London Daily Post, Oct. 21, 1741, Mrs. Careless advertises The Beggar's Opera, at the theatre in James-Street, Haymarket, for her benefit, Oct. 27. At the bottom of the advertisement she says, "Mrs. Careless takes this benefit because she finds a small pressing occasion for one: and as she has the happiness of knowing she has a great many friends, hopes not to find an instance to the contrary by their being absent the above-mentioned evening; and as it would be entirely inconvenient, and consequently disagreeable, if they should, she ventures to believe they won't fail to let her have the honour of their company." In the bill of the day she says—"N. B. Mrs. Careless hopes her friends will favour her according to their promise, to relieve her from terrible fits of the vapours proceeding from bad dreams, though the comfort is they generally go by the contraries.

"Tickets to be had at Mrs. Careless's Coffee-house, the Playhouse-Passage, Bridges-Street."

Would the public, at this period of refinement, have patiently endured the familiar address of such a shameless, superannuated, advertising strumpet?

The reader will perhaps smile, when, after so much grave ratiocination, and this long deduction of particulars, he is informed that the letters are not E. C. but F. C. the initials of Fanny Cock, daughter to the celebrated auctioneer of that name, with whom our artist had had some casual disagreement.

The following, somewhat different, explanation has also been communicated to me by Charles Rogers, esq. who says it came from Sullivan, one of Hogarth's engravers: "The nobleman threatens to cane a quack-doctor for having given pills which proved ineffectual in curing a girl he had debauched; and brings with him a woman, from whom he alledges he caught the infection; at which she, in a rage, is preparing to stab him with her clasp knife. This wretch is one of the lowest class, as is manifest by the letters of her name marked with gunpowder on her breast. She, however, is brought to the French barber-surgeon for his examination and inspection, and for which purpose he is wiping his spectacles with his coarse muckender."

The explanation given by Rouquet, however, ought not to be suppressed, as in all probability he received it from Hogarth. "Il falloit indiquer la mauvaise conduite du héros de la piece. L'auteur pour cet effet l'introduit dans l'appartement d'un empirique, où il ne peut guères se trouver qu'en consequence de ses débauches; il fait en même tems rencontrer chez cet empirique une de ces femmes qui perdues depuis long-tems, font enfin leur métier de la perte des autres. Il suppose un démêlé entre cette femme et son héros, dont le sujet paroît être la mauvaise santé d'un petite fille, du commerce de laquelle il ne s'est pas bien trouvé. La petite fille au reste fait ici contraste par son âge, sa timidité, sa douceur, avec le caractère de l'autre femme, qui paroît un composé de rage, de fureur, et de tous les crimes qui accompagnent d'ordinaire les dernières débauches chez celles de son sexe.

"L'empirique et son appartement sont des objets entièrement épisodiques. Quoique jadis barbier,[A] il est aujourdhui, si l'on en juge par l'etalage, non seulment chirurgien, mais naturaliste, chimiste, mechanicien, medecin, apoticaire; et vous remarquerez qu'il est François pour comble de ridicule. L'auteur pour achever de le caracteriser suivant son idée, lui fait inventer des machines extrèmement composées pour les opérations les plus simples, comme celles de remettre un membre disloqué, ou de déboucher une bouteille.

"Je ne deciderai pas si l'auteur est aussi heureux dans le choix des objets de sa satire, quand il les prend parmi nous, que lorsqu'il les choisit parmi ceux de sa nation; mais il me semble qu'il doit mieux connoître ceux-ci; et je crois que cette planche vous en paroîtra un exemple bien marqué. Il tourne ici en ridicule ce que nous avons de moins mauvais; que deviendroit le reste s'il étoit vrai qu'il nous connût assez pour nous depeindre?"

[A] This circumstance seems to be implied by the broken comb, the pewter bason, and the horn so placed as to resemble a barber's pole, all which are exhibited either above, or within the glass case, in which the skeleton appears whispering a man who had been exsiccated by some mode of embalming at present unknown. About the time of the publication of this set of prints, a number of bodies thus preserved were discovered in a vault in Whitechapel church.—Our Quack is likewise a virtuoso. An ancient spur, a high-crowned hat, old shoes, &c. together with a model of the gallows, are among his rarities.—On his table is a skull, rendered carious by the disease he is professing to cure.—These two last objects are monitory as well as characteristic.