The engraving, like all those belonging to this period, is very rough; but it was evidently prepared specially for the occasion, and some care appears to have been taken to represent the '_Java_' as he is described. It is a genuine attempt to illustrate the story, and on that account is more interesting than some of the woodcuts in the early newspapers. The Earl of Strafford, who was executed on Tower Hill, May 12, 1641, forms the subject of more than one illustrated tract of this period. In 1642 was published a curious pamphlet, consisting of an engraved title and eight pages of illustrations, representing the principal events of 1641-2. There are sixteen illustrations, exclusive of the title, two on each page. They are all etched on copper, and are done with some freedom and artistic ability. I shall have occasion to refer to this pamphlet hereafter; but at present I have copied the engraving entitled, 'The Earle of Strafford for treasonable practises beheaded on the Tower-hill.' In this example of illustrated news the artist has faithfully represented the locality in his background, but there the truth of his pencil stops. Strafford himself, although his head is not yet severed from his body, lies at full length on the scaffold, and instead of the usual block used for decapitations the victim's head rests on an ordinary plank or thick piece of wood. There is no one standing on the scaffold but the executioner, whereas history asserts that the Earl was attended in his last moments by his brother, Sir George Wentworth, the Earl of Cleveland, and Archbishop Usher. These omissions, if they were noticed at all, were no doubt looked upon as trivial faults in the infancy of illustrated journalism, and before a truth-loving public had learnt to be satisfied with nothing less than 'sketches done on the spot.' What appears to be a more correct view of the execution was, however, published at the time. In the British Museum are two etchings by Hollar (single sheets, 1641), representing the trial and execution of the Earl of Strafford. They both look as if they had been done from sketches on the spot, that of the execution giving a correct view of the Tower and the surrounding buildings, but they are too crowded to admit of reproduction on a reduced scale. [Illustration: EXECUTION OF STRAFFORD, 1641.] The taste of the time tolerated the publication of satires and petty lampoons even upon dead men. Soon after Strafford's death a tract was published entitled '_A Description of the Passage of Thomas, late Earle of Strafford, over the River of Styx, with the Conference betwixt him, Charon, and William Noy_.' There is a dialogue between Strafford and Charon, of which the following is a specimen:--