A man of importance

Gillray, James, 1756-1815 · May 16, 1799

Lord Moira, rigid and impassive, stands in profile to the left, right hand on his tasselled stick, left hand on hip, wearing quasi-military dress with looped cocked hat and high boots. Clouds, so coloured as to suggest a distant conflagration, and a low horizon, curved as if to indicate the edge of the globe, form a background (BM). / A nobleman frequently attacked by the Tory press of this period, on account of the part he took in Irish politics. The verses are taken from the Anti-Jacobin, a Tory journal remarkable for its bitterness. He voted, however, for the Union, in opposition to his own party, the Whigs, who were generally opposed to that measure (Wright/Evans).