This is a small detail which reappears, in slightly different forms, in all three prints of the 'Grotesque Trilogy' featured here. It shows a classical temple on top of Mount Helicon, the home of the Muses. Here, though, Gillray shows it surmounted by a leaping, winged ass, a parody of the winged horse and friend of the Muses named Pegasus; he is suggesting the travesty of literary greatness which Thicknesse's writings represent.

Detail from: James Gillray, Lieutenant Govenor Gall-Stone, inspired by Alecto; -or- The Birth of Minerva. The British Museum

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