1851 or The Adventures of Mr and Mrs Sandboys: Looking for Lodgings

This illustration was published in '1851: or The adventures of Mr and Mrs Sandboys and family who came up to London to 'enjoy themselves' and to see the Great Exhibition' , with text by Henry Mayhew and illustrations by George Cruikshank. The illustrations were published as a separate portfolio of prints.

The book was a comic novel describing the adventures of the Sandboys family who travelled from Cumberland to London to visit the Great Exhibition, eventually arriving just as it closed. Cruikshank shows the family being offered a hammock in a meagre room with the landlady explaining that she has just let the last tent on the tiles to a foreign nobleman. Cruikshank was preoccupied with the crowds of visitors to the Great Exhibition in 1851 and its impact on London.

There is another version of this print in the collection, 80.349/2.