The Downfall of Sejanus.(Satirical broadside on Robert Walpole and the Excise Crisis, comparing him with Sejanus and the de Wit brothers.) First edition of the engraving.

London: circa 1733. Engraving. 40 x 33cm. Mounted on a support sheet....British Museum 1868,0808.3554:Satirical broadside on Robert Walpole and the Excise Crisis, comparing him with Sejanus and the de Wit brothers. A street scene with an executioner, saying "This is the fate of all Oppressors", dragging the headless body of Walpole whose head lies at the feet of another executioner holding up an axe who says, "Thus I've sever'd ye Head which contrive'd so much Ill, To prevent fresh Occasions to bring in the B[ill]"; to right, a procession of weeping excisemen in funeral dress and carrying sextants and other measuring instruments; in the background a group of women are about to burn the body, saying "We shall use him to[o] well do the worst that we can/For he has Nothing about him worth ye name of a man". Four lines of verse at the foot of the image refereing to the fate of the de Wits, and verses below in two columns referring to Walpole. 1733....Bibliographic references:BM Satires / Catalogue of Political and Personal Satires in the Department of Prints and Drawings in the British Museum (1939)