 First Stage[etching] |
 Second Stage [etching] |
 Third Stage[etching] |
 Fourth Stage[woodcut] |
| Tom Nero, the boy in the white cap (first stage) is "in the care of the Parish of St. Giles." He tortures a dog with an arrow. One boy tries to stop him, while other children in the scene torment other animals. Hogarth's caption: |
By the second stage, Tom Nero, now a young man, is seen beating a horse while a bystander takes down his name in order to complain to the authorities of his cruelty. Hogarth's caption: |
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While various Scenes of sportive Woe The Infant Race employ. And tortur'd Victims bleeding shew The Tyrant in the boy Behold a Youth of gentler Heart To spare the Creature's pain O take, he cries -- take all my Tart. But Tears and Tart are vain. Learn from this fair Example -- You Whom savage Sports delight How Cruelty disgusts the view While Pity charms the sight. |
The generous Steed in hoary Age Subdu'd by Labour lies, And mourns a cruel Master's rage, While Nature Strength denies. The tender lamb o'er drove and faint Amidst expiring Throws Bleats forth its innocent complaint And dies beneath the Blows. Inhuman Wretch! Say whence proceeds This coward Cruelty? What Int'rest springs from barb'rous deeds? What Joy from Misery? |
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In the third stage ["Cruelty in Perfection"], Nero has been captured after committing a series of robberies, including the murder of the woman who carries his child. He will be hung. In stage four ["The Reward of Cruelty"], as was often the fate of those executed by the State, his body has been turned over to surgeons for dissection. Some art historians suggest Nero "is represented as still alive, for it was a particular fear of criminals that they would survive the hanging and be conscious at their dissection."
Reference: David Bindman, Hogarth and His Times: Serious Comedy, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1997 Also, don't miss Jenny Uglow, Hogarth: A Life and a World, New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1997 See also the Spartacus site in UK on William Hogarth. back to Sue Coe: Pit's Letter [gallery view] / [quick download] | Sue Coe index 
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