The Dance of Death: The Last Chase

A skeletal Death rides a phantom horse over a cliff edge, hurling hunters, hounds, and horses into the void below — fox-hunting's aristocratic thrill literalised as mass carnage. The caption reads: *Such mortal Sport the Chase attends; / At Break-Neck Hill, the Hunting Ends.* Rowlandson's aquatint — acid-bitten lines softened by fluid watercolour washes — gave Georgian satirical prints their characteristic warm, bawdy energy. The mounted figures are plump gentlemen-sportsmen, their class rendered through ruddy excess rather than malice, yet the joke is firmly at their expense: privilege meets its physical consequence. This sheet belongs to the *Dance of Death* series Rowlandson produced for publisher Ackermann, adapting the medieval *danse macabre* into social comedy. That fusion of sequential narrative, typed characters, and moral punchline feeds directly into the comic strip tradition.