3-003-969 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

"The Foundling", by G. B. O'Neill, in the National Gallery, South Kensington Museum, 1861. Engraving of a painting. 'Round the table of the boardroom in the union-house the guardians are assembled - hard, matter-of-fact men - examining a child which has been found in the street. The nurse who has it in charge is an admirable study...her broad, well-filled, but wrinkled countenance speaking of many creature comforts taken on the sly, her air of importance well befitting her important calling...We are told...that this personage is an exact portrait of some official original. The beadle, who would have it understood that he knows something more than other folk about the matter, shows his wisdom by not opening his lips. An elderly guardian is looking at the little stranger through a glass, with assumed indifference, as if he had never seen...anything of the kind before. The chairman, however, seems to have a doubt upon this point, in which the energetic gentleman to his right seems to participate. The child itself, a stout, promising urchin, with a vulgar cast of feature, is wholly unconcerned at the scrutiny and discussion of which he is the subject, and sprawls across the table as if attracted by a spectacle-case belonging to one of the guardians'. From "Illustrated London News", 1861.