*The Great Lozenge-Maker*

Death has taken a day job. In a tidy confectioner's shop a skeleton stands at the mortar in apron and cap, grinding out sweets; the shelves behind hold jars marked "Bon-bons for Juvenile Parties," the cask at his elbow reads "Arsenic," and a crate of "Plaster of Paris" waits to bulk out the batch. The title calls him the great lozenge-maker and offers a hint to fathers. Leech drew it for Punch after real cases of candy poisoned by adulterants alarmed the public. Cut in wood for the weekly, the image argues by pure visual shorthand, a labelled skeleton and a few labelled containers, no speech required. This is the editorial cartoon in its mature form: a single legible picture built to land a public-health scandal on a reader in one glance.