Posting in Scotland

James Gillray British
After Charles Loraine Smith British
Publisher Hannah Humphrey British

Not on view

Gillray here satirically suggests that Scotland remained wild and uncultivated in the early nineteenth century. A clumsy post-chaise loses it front wheels while traveling through a moorland landscape, tossing its occupant through the front window. This is hardly surprising since the chaise is pulled by the ill-matched team of horse and donkey whose traces are made of rough rope rather than leather. A barking dog has precipitated the accident, the companion to a shepherd lying in the foreground. All of the Scotsmen in the image are shown bare-footed and wearing apron-like kilts that bare their posteriors, a visual joke that makes literal the supposition that Scotsmen wear no undergarments under their kilts.

Posting in Scotland, James Gillray (British, London 1756–1815 London), Hand-colored etching and aquatint

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