A slow and sure deliverance, an anticipation sketch, William Dent, 1788

Two lawyers (plumer and dallas) in wig and gown carry (right to left) an ornate palanquin in which hastings is seated, wearing his accustomed jewelled turban; he raises a curtain to look out. On the palanquin (which in form resembles a sedan chair) are the initials 'w h. ' a third lawyer (left), hastings's leading counsel, law (left), marches in front with a triumphant gait; he holds his brief in his left hand, in his right a large money-bag inscribed 'fee'. Beside him is a signpost pointing 'to st. James's'. Beside the palanquin walks thurlow holding out a sword inscribed 'justice', the point supporting an enormous hat on whose crown is a royal crown. This completely protects the palanquin from a blast directed against it from the head of burke, which emerges from clouds in the upper left corner of the design. His hand also emerges, holding a roll inscribed 'impeachment'. In thurlow's left hand is a money-bag inscribed 'treatise on friendship'. These four protectors of hastings are walking on the heads of a crowd of peers wearing coronets who are all asleep. Among them is one bishop on whose head thurlow tramples. Across them is written 'honor'. In the background (right) is a hill on whose summit is a post surmounted by a weathercock and inscribed 'evidence'. A hand attached to the post points downwards and to the left inscribed 'to the high court'. Fox and sheridan toil up the hill holding the poles of a carrying-chair in which sits a man grasping a large money-bag inscribed 'treatise on the yellow jaundice'. Fox turns to him, saying, "why not swear here what you asserted elsewhere ?" 2 april 1788 etching. Date: 1788. Dimensions: Height: 243 mm; Width: 349 mm. Medium: paper. Depicted People: Edmund Burke. Collection: British Museum. A slow and sure deliverance, an anticipation sketch (BM 1868,0808.5708)