Edward Horsman, 'The Eccentric Liberal'

Labeled Statesmen, No. 121 and captioned "The eccentric Liberal," this chromolithograph caricatures Edward Horsman (1807–1876), Liberal MP notorious for his proud independence and biting oratory — Gladstone once called him the 'first of the superiores.' The artist, signing as Lyall, exaggerates Horsman's lean, stooped frame into near-absurdity: an enormous brooding head sunk onto narrow shoulders, an orange frock-coat pinching a wasp waist, pale thin legs, and a top hat dangling behind him like an afterthought. One hand props his chin in theatrical deliberation. The physical distortion is social commentary — a man whose outsized self-regard, the image implies, dwarfs his actual political achievement.