Term Time or The Lawyers All Alive in Westminster Hall by Dighton, Robert (Senior) - 1795

1795. pen and black ink with watercolor, on laid paper. pen and black ink with watercolor, on laid paper. "A Peep Into the Court of Kings Bench" Dighton, Robert (Senior) [1752-1814]. Term Time or The Lawyers All Alive in Westminster Hall. [London, 1795]. Glazed and attractively matted 13-3/8" x 9-7/8" watercolor and pen and black ink on laid paper, signed, numbered and captioned on bottom margin, in handsome 24" x 18-1/4" frame with a few minor nicks and scratches. $15,000. * A superb watercolor satirizing lawyers, judges and juries. "Three judges preside over lawyers who jabber among themselves. No interest is taken in clients and it is impossible to say if one is actually present, although the crestfallen man holding a hat, on the right of the picture, could be a plaintiff. Meanwhile the jury of five men sit in their box exhibiting at least one deficiency each: they appear to be individually deaf, blind, asleep, dumb and sick in the head" (Padbury). The piece is numbered 557 and captioned, after the title, with a strike-through: "A Peep into the Court of Kings Bench." Robert Dighton was a portrait painter, printmaker and caricaturist known for his satirical views of elite Londoners. Three of his children and two of his grandchildren followed in his footsteps. This watercolor was part of the collection of David Edward Padbury, an authority on the work of the Dightons. Padbury, A View of Dightons: The Dighton Family, Their Times, Caricatures and Portraits 39, 82.