Humours of an Election Humours of an Election The Humours of an Election is a series of four oil paintings and later engravings by William Hogarth that illustrate the election of a member of parliament in Oxfordshire in 1754. The oil paintings were created in 1755. The first three paintings, "An Election Entertainment", "Canvassing for Votes" and "The Polling", demonstrate the corruption endemic in parliamentary elections in the 18th century, before the Great Reform Act. The last painting, "Chairing the Member", shows the celebrations of the victorious Tory candidates and their supporters. At this time each constituency elected two MPs, and there was a
A Harlot's Progress of six prints to subscribers for a Guinea. Pirate copies of the engravings were soon in circulation, and Hogarth procured a 1735 Act of Parliament (8 Geo. II. cap. 13) to prohibit the practice. Soon after, Hogarth published his second series of satirical and moralistic images, "A Rake's Progress", followed ten years later by "Marriage à-la-mode". The original paintings were destroyed in a fire at Fonthill House in 1755, the country house of William Beckford (1709–1770), a politician and father of William Thomas Beckford (1 October 1760 – 2 May 1844) builder of Fonthill Abbey in Wiltshire. The original plates