"His Majesty King Valoroso," seventeenth illustration by W. M. Thackeray for "The Rose and The Ring" (1855)

His Majesty King Valoroso

W. M. Thackeray

1855

Wood engraving, probably by William Linton

7.5 cm high by 3.9 cm wide (3 ⅛ by 1 ½ inches), vignetted

Seventeenth illustration for Thackeray’s The Rose and The Ring, p. 321.

Thackeray shows a much changed, sickly-looking monarch who, despite his thinness, is but a shadow of his former, vigorous self seen in "Little lion was my brudder". several pages earlier. Descriptive headlines: "Much I Fear when Hearts are Ill, Small's the Good of Doctor's Pill" (320-21).

Scanned image and text by Philip V. Allingham.

[You may use this image without prior permission for any scholarly or educational purpose as long as you (1) credit the person who scanned the image and (2) link your document to this URL in a web document or cite the Victorian Web in a print one.]

Passage Illustrated: A Sickly-looking Monarch in 18th c. garb

His Majesty King Valoroso, as we have seen, had his own reasons for disliking his nephew; and as for those innocent readers who ask why?—I beg (with the permission of their dear parents) to refer them to Shakespeare’s pages, where they will read why King John disliked Prince Arthur. With the Queen, his royal but weak-minded aunt, when Giglio was out of sight he was out of mind. While she had her whist and her evening parties, she cared for little else. ["VI. How Prince Giglio Behaved Himself," 321]

Bibliography

Furniss, Harry. The Rose and The Ring; or, The History of Prince Giglio and the Prince Bulbo. William Makepeace Thackeray's Christmas Books. With illustrations by the author and Harry Furniss. The Harry Furniss Centenary Edition. London: Macmillan and Co., 1911. Pp. 287-428.

Titmarsh, M. A. [W. M. Thackeray].The Rose and The Ring. London: Smith, Elder, 1855.

Created 19 July 2022