INVASION SQUIBS, _continued_--‘BRITONS TO ARMS’--BRAGGADOCIO--NAPOLEON’S EPITAPH. A most ghastly picture, which should not be called a caricature, yet is meant so to be, is by Gillray (July 26, 1803), and is called ‘Buonaparte forty-eight Hours after Landing!’ A crowd of rural volunteers are assembled, and one of them hoists the head of Napoleon upon a pitchfork, calling out ‘Ha, my little Boney! what do’st think of Johnny Bull, now? Plunder Old England! hay? make French slaves of us all! hay? ravish all our Wives and Daughters! hay? O Lord, help that silly Head! To think that Johnny Bull would ever suffer those lanthorn Jaws to become King of Old England Roast Beef and Plum pudding.’ Whilst on the top of the engraving is inscribed, ‘This is to give information for the benefit of all Jacobin Adventurers, that Policies are now open’d at Lloyd’s--where the depositer of One Guinea is entitled to a Hundred if the Corsican Cut throat is alive 48 Hours after Landing on the British Coast.’ [Illustration] Ansell also takes up this gruesome subject (August 6, 1803) in ‘After the Invasion. The Levée en Masse, or Britons Strike Home.’ The French have landed, but have been thoroughly defeated; the British soldiers driving them bodily over the cliffs, into the sea. The women are plundering the dead, but complain bitterly of the poverty of their spoil. ‘Why, this is poor finding, I have emptied the pockets of a score and only found garlic, one head of an onion, and a parcel of pill boxes.’ A rural volunteer, who has Bonaparte’s head on a pitchfork, addresses two comrades thus: ‘Here he is exalted, my Lads, 24 Hours after Landing.’ Says one of the countrymen, ‘Why, Harkee, d’ye zee, I never liked soldiering afore, but, somehow or other, when I thought of our Sal, the bearns, the poor Cows, and the Geese, why I could have killed the whole Army, my own self.’ The other remarks, ‘Dang my Buttons if that beant the head of that Rogue Boney--I told our Squire this morning, What do you think, says I, the lads of our Village can’t cut up a Regiment of them French Mounseers? and, as soon as the Lasses had given us a Kiss for good luck, I could have sworn we should do it, and so we have.’ Of loyal and patriotic songs, there are enough and to spare, but one was very popular, and therefore should be reproduced:-- BRITONS TO ARMS!!! Written by WM. THOS. FITZGERALD, Esqr., And Recited by him at the ANNUAL MEETING of the LITERARY FUND, at GREENWICH. 14 July, 1803.