2-652-549 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

'Punch', 1874-1876, (1946). The face of Punch (or Polichinelle in the Commedia dell'Arte), resembles that of the conservative president of the Third Republic, Patrice de MacMahon (1808-1893). In May 1871, MacMahon led the troops of the Versailles government against the Commune. In the bitter fighting known as La Semaine Sanglante ('The Bloody Week'), the Commune was crushed, with many communards being executed. From The Etchings of the French Impressionists and Their Contemporaries, by Edward T. Chase. [The Hyperion Press, Paris, 1946]