From the exhibition
'The Ear' — Sir William Bartlett-Dalby, Knight
Carlo Pellegrini · 22 December 1888

Carlo Pellegrini ('Ape') presents Sir William Bartlett-Dalby — aural surgeon and Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons — in full-length profile, bent slightly forward as if attending to a distant sound, a posture that winks at his specialty. He wears the Victorian gentleman's uniform: frock coat, grey trousers, top hat, and a gold-headed cane tucked under one arm. The caption reads simply *'the ear'*. Pellegrini's caricature exaggerates Bartlett-Dalby's prominent nose and jutting jaw, standard tools of the physiognomic shorthand that Victorian satirical portraiture applied to professional men. The great specialist is caught literally cocking his head at the world. The plate is signed 'Ape' in the lower left.
Carlo Pellegrini CC0