Detail from "The ghost of Eustace Budgel Esqr. to the man in blue most humbly inscrib'd to His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales"

published by Eliza Haywood at the sign of Fame
1742

Lewis Walpole Library, 742.00.00.10++ Impression 2

In the right-hand scene, Sir Robert Walpole raises his hands in horror at the appearance of the ghost of Eustace Budgell, shown here in a detail from the full image. Budgell, a critic of Walpole's ministry who had committed suicide by drowning, holds a paper described in the verses to left as a "black Account ...Full twenty Winters of Misdeeds." Budgell's ghost points at a scene of a beheading in the background above which flies Time; Justice sits on a column beside the scaffold and a crowd cheers below.