This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 2/25/2023
SMITH, John Raphael and William WARD. The Gamesters. London: Published by J.R. Smith, No. 83 Oxford Street, May 22, 1786. Fine and large colored mezzotint depicting two sharpers fleecing a mark while playing cards. The caption below the image reads, “Vice whatever sex or form it may assume leadeth to destruction; -- woe to the unwary youth who hath been seduced into its acquaintance. –Peters.” Sheet size 19 5/8 x 20 ½”. Unobtrusive marginal soiling. A bright and crisp impression, delicately colored. Matted. Published in MAGIC: 1400s – 1950s, pages 48 – 49. Also see Chaloner Smith, British Mezzotint Portraits [Ward] 97, [Smith], 186. Based on a painting by Rev. Matthew William Peters by men considered two of the finest eighteenth-century engravers. The sharper depicted “giving the office” (signaling his partner) is sometimes thought to be Thomas Rowlandson.