The Hopes of the Family in the Road to Preferment A country gentleman buys a place for his son. On the right is the country gentleman (facing right), wearing spurs and holding a round hat on one hand and a riding crop under one arm. He is giving a moneybag to a bowing man on the right (facing left). The man is dressed all in black and is wearing glasses - he may be a lawyer. The country gentleman says: "You must know sir - this be our only son - a nation cute lad - I assure you. Lately he has taken it into his head he should like a place under Government,- so hearing Mr X.Y. of you kind advertizements in the Public Prints I thought it the best way to come up to London with my son and the depositer money." The bowing man replies: "Nobly resolved - you may depend on the place in the course of a fortnight." On the far left stands the son in question. He is snub-nosed and is standing pigeon-toed. Standing to his right is his mother, a large woman wearing a mobcap and with a portrait of her son hanging around her neck and a fan in one hand. She addresses her son: "Hold up your head - my Darling." The son replies: "I do Mother, I do, but some how I allways be flurried before great Men." 26 Mar 1799