Our artist, in the scene of _Evening_, inserted the little girl with the fan, as an after-thought, some friend having asked him what the boy cried for. He therefore introduced the girl going to take the play-thing from her brother. Nothing is more common than to see children cry without reason. The circumstance, however, shews that this great Genius did not always think himself above advice, as some have alledged to have been the case with him. In the early impressions of this plate, the face and neck of the woman are coloured with red, to express heat; and the hand of her husband is tinged with blue, to intimate that he was by trade a _Dyer_. The purchasers of the plate, intituled _Evening_, are hereby cautioned against imposition. In a modern copy of it, sold to the late Mr. _Ingham Foster_, the face of the woman had been washed over with vermilion, that it might pass (as it chanced to do) for a first impression. In the true ones, and none but these, the face and bosom were _printed_ off with red, and the hand with blue ink. Only the traces of the graver, therefore, ought to be filled by either colour, and not the whole surface of the visage, &c. as in the smeary counterfeit. I have been told that a few copies of plate III. were taken off before the fan was inserted, but have not hitherto met with one of them. In _Night_, the drunken Free-mason has been supposed to be Sir _Thomas de Veil_; but Sir _John Hawkins_ assures me, it is not the least like him. The _Salisbury Flying-Coach_ implies a satire on the right honourable inventor of that species of carriage. The two first of these pictures were sold to the Duke of _Ancaster_, for 57 Guineas; the remaining pair to Sir _William Heathcote_ for 64. [1] _Hogarth_ advertises in _The London Daily Post, January_ 20, 1737-8, five copper plates, viz. Morning, Noon, Evening and Night, and a Company of Strolling Actresses dressing in a barn, for _one guinea_, half to be paid at the time of subscribing, half on the delivery. After the subscription, to be raised to five shillings a plate. [2] A hornpipe dancer at _Covent Garden_. She was mistress to _Shuter_ the comedian, &c. &c. &c. 2. Strolling Actresses[1] dressing in a Barn. _Invented, painted, engraved, and published by W. Hogarth_. Mr. _Walpole_ observes that this piece, "for wit and imagination, without any other end," is the best of all our artist's works. Mr. _Wood_ of _Littelton_ has the original, for which he paid only 26 Guineas.