A caricature appeared in 1756 representing a street, in the precincts of Westminster it is presumed, filled with a crowd of enthusiastic patriots on their way to make a bonfire of the offending minister in effigy. The figure wears a cocked hat, and has a wig and mask, evidently copied from those of the living prototype, mounted on a stick; the coat and gloves are stuffed; the legs are sticks, bound up into a rude resemblance to stockings and shoes. The effigy is strapped on horseback. At the rear is a gibbet, on which the dummy premier is to be finally suspended. One of the mob bears a supply of faggots. Beneath this pictorial satire, which is executed something in the style of Sayer, the caricaturist of a later date, appear the verses:-- “Were you in effigy to burn Each treacherous statesman in his turn, What better would Britannia be, Whilst the proud knaves themselves are free? Knaves have brought disgrace upon her! Have bought her votes and sold her Honour!” [Illustration: BURNING A PRIME MINISTER IN EFFIGY. 1756. (FROM DR. NEWTON’S COLLECTION.)] The following manifesto explains the object of this publication, an appeal “Against Corruption,” and directed to securing the purity of elections against Ministerial bribery. The subject of the squib was evidently suggested by the Guy Fawkes processions of November. It appeared at the time when the Newcastle and Fox administration was near its fall and after those expensive elections in which the duke had spent enormous sums in bribery. “Who can call to remembrance without abhorrence the behaviour of a Whiggish Ministry, who, neglecting everything else but the business of Bribery and Corruption, reduced the credit of the Nation and themselves to so low an ebb, that at length they were obliged to import Hessian and Hanoverian Troops to support an immense unconstitutional standing army, in defending them and their measures at home; whilst our perfidious enemies ravaged and distressed our wretched Colonies in every other part of the globe. Now it would be well for England if the several Tory or motley administrations since that time could demonstrate that they have spent less time and treasure in the same destructive employment. As a tree is known by its fruit, so is a bad minister by his attempting to influence Electors, or even to gain a Majority of the Elected by any other means than the justice of his measures; otherwise the use of a national Council is superseded; and when a King is thus deprived of the disinterested deliberations of his people in Parliament, the authors of the undue influence are certainly guilty of Treason in the strictest sense of the word.” CHAPTER VI. JOHN WILKES AS A POPULAR REPRESENTATIVE.