against Napoleon we find, it is true, done in the regular John Bull
style, with the Gilray model for the little upstart Corsican: but as
soon as the Emperor had yielded to stern fortune our artist's heart
relented (as Beranger's did on the other side of the water), and many
of our readers will doubtless recollect a fine drawing of "Louis XVIII.
trying on Napoleon's boots," which did not certainly fit the gouty
son of Saint Louis. Such satirical hits as these, however, must not be
considered as political, or as anything more than the expression of the
artist's national British idea of Frenchmen.

It must be confessed that for that great nation Mr. Cruikshank
entertains a considerable contempt. Let the reader examine the "Life in
Paris," or the five hundred designs in which Frenchmen are introduced,
and he will find them almost invariably thin, with ludicrous
spindle-shanks, pigtails, outstretched hands, shrugging shoulders, and
queer hair and mustachios. He has the British idea of a Frenchman; and
if he does not believe that the inhabitants of France are for the most
part dancing-masters and barbers, yet takes care to depict such in
preference, and would not speak too well of them. It is curious
how these traditions endure. In France, at the present moment, the
Englishman on the stage is the caricatured Englishman at the time of the
war, with a shock red head, a long white coat, and invariable gaiters.
Those who wish to study this subject should peruse Monsieur Paul de
Kock's histories of "Lord Boulingrog" and "Lady Crockmilove." On the
other hand, the old emigre has taken his station amongst us, and we
doubt if a good British gallery would understand that such and such a
character WAS a Frenchman unless he appeared in the ancient traditional
costume.

A curious book, called "Life in Paris," published in 1822, contains