Roger Eykyn, 'The Police Champion'

Plate No. 213 in the Statesmen series caricatures Roger Eykyn, Liberal MP for Windsor, here nicknamed 'The Police Champion' — a pointed reference to his parliamentary advocacy for metropolitan police reform. The chromolithograph, attributed to James Tissot rather than the usual Spy or Ape, shows Eykyn in three-quarter stance, hands thrust into coat pockets, reddish mutton-chop whiskers swept long beneath a balding crown. The exaggeration is physiognomic rather than ethnic: Tissot inflates the nose and jaw into a cheerful leer while keeping the figure's clothing — brown frock coat, waistcoat, loose trousers — respectably mid-Victorian. The nickname carries mild mockery: a backbench MP championing constables was not quite the grandest Statesman ambition, and Tissot's smug, self-satisfied posture underlines that irony neatly.