From the exhibition
Hugh Henry Rose, 1st Baron Strathnairn
Carlo Pellegrini · 1870

Carlo Pellegrini ('Ape') renders Field Marshal Lord Strathnairn in profile, head bowed, white-gloved hands clasped at the waist. The figure wears a dark frock coat and grey trousers beneath a silver top hat; a ducal coronet floats in the upper corner, signalling rank. The caption — *'He was made a Statesman because he was a soldier'* — is Vanity Fair's dry parliamentary joke: Rose entered the Lords as a reward for Lucknow, not for any legislative gift. Pellegrini employs facial exaggeration — hooked nose, jutting jaw, leathery skin — characteristic of Victorian caricature vocabulary.
Carlo Pellegrini Public domain