An Awkward Position, from "Illustrated London News"

Harvey Orrin Smith

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The incident shown is described by a biographer: “When [Oliver] Goldsmith resided at Islington, he sometimes extended his walks to the White Conduit House, then in the fields…While strolling one day in the gardens, he met three females of the family of a respectable tradesman, to whom he was under some obligation. He kindly conducted them about the garden, treated them to tea, and ran up a bill in the most open-handed manner imaginable; it was only when he came to pay that he found himself in one of his old dilemmas: he had not the money in his pocket. A scene of perplexity now took place between him and the waiter, in the midst of which came up some of his acquaintances, in whose eyes he wished to stand particularly well. This completed his mortification. There was no concealing the awkwardness of his position. The sneers of the waiter revealed it; his acquaintances amused themselves for some time at his expense, professing their inability to relieve him. When they had enjoyed their banter, the waiter was paid, and Goldsmith enabled to convey off the ladies."

Drawings and Prints

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Department’s vast collection of works on paper comprises approximately 21,000 drawings, 1.2 million prints, and 12,000 illustrated books created in Europe and the Americas from about 1400 to the present day. Since its foundation in 1916, the Department has been committed to collecting a wide range of works on paper, which includes both pieces that are incredibly rare and lauded for their aesthetic appeal, as well as material that is more popular, functional, and ephemeral. The broad scope of the department’s collecting encourages questions of connoisseurship as well as those pertaining to function and context, and demonstrates the vital role that prints, drawings, and illustrated books have played throughout history.

Metropolitan Museum of Art