The Westminster election of 1784 was an event of importance in the political history of the last century; it was the only serious check that the Court encountered in the attempt to return a subservient House of Commons; and circumstances combined to render it the most remarkable struggle of the kind that has been witnessed. The metropolis was kept in a state of ebullition for weeks; the poll was opened on April 1st, and continued without intermission until May 17th. During this time, Covent Garden and the Strand were the scenes of daily combats between the rival mobs; the papers were filled with squibs of the most personal nature, according to their respective sides in politics, and hundreds of pictorial satires appeared on every incident, and embodying all the successive stages of the struggle. Rowlandson, who entered with spirit into the contest, chiefly in the Foxite interests, alone produced on an average a fresh caricature every day; the best of these are reproduced in the life of the caricaturist, and a selection of these subjects, from the work in question, are given among the present illustrations of the subject. The representatives of Westminster in the previous parliament were Fox and Sir Brydges Rodney. Sir Cecil Wray, lately a follower of the Whig party, had been nominated for the last parliament by the Whig chief, but on this occasion Wray ungratefully deserted his political leader, and was put forward as the ministerial nominee. The king and Court had resolved to exert every influence to cause Fox’s defeat on personal grounds. Admiral Lord Hood was also a Court candidate, but it was Wray who was more especially held forth as the antagonist of the “Man of the People.” The political apostate was stigmatized as “Judas Iscariot, who betrayed his master.” Other charges against him were certain proposals he is said to have made for the suppression of Chelsea Hospital and a project for a tax upon maid-servants; to these were added the general cries against his supporters of attempting an undue elevation of the prerogative, and also against the prevalent “back-stair” influence.