Title: CONSOLATION, or 'Otium cum dignitate'
Materials: paper
Techniques: lithograph
Production person: Print made by John Doyle (HB)
Printed by: Charles Motte
Published by: Thomas McLean
Production place: London, England
Date: Oct. 7, 1829
Schools/Styles: British satire

[British Museum Satires 15876]

Description
No. 33. Lord Eldon, registering melancholy, sits in an arm-chair beside a table on which, besides plate, jug, &c., is an enormous cheese (from which a small wedge has been cut) resting on a cheese-stand on little wheels. In his right hand he holds a huge cut-glass goblet; he extends his left hand to the cheese, saying, 'My Cheshire Cheese & my Glass form now my only Consolation.'



(Description and comment from M. Dorothy George, 'Catalogue of Political and Personal Satires in the British Museum', XI, 1954)
Eldon in 1829 received "innumerable marks of respect and confidence" for his opposition to Emancipation. Twiss, 'Life of Eldon', iii. 102. Like the Duke of York in 1825, see No. 14780, he received a cheese from the Protestants of Cheshire. Mrs. Arbuthnot wrote of Eldon, 29 Apr. 1829, "He cannot forgive being out of office, although to my knowledge for the last five years he had been continually urging upon the King & Government & Parliament his anxious desire to resign". 'Journal', 1950, ii. 185. Cf. Nos. 15396, 15904, 16102.

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