An insane man (Tom Rakewell) sits on the floor manically grasping at his head, his lover (Sarah Young) cries at the spectacle while two attendants attach chains to his legs; they are surrounded by other lunatics at Bethlem hospital, London. Engraving by W. Hogarth, 1735.

London (Fleet Street) : Robt. Sayer

1 print : line engraving with etching ; platemark 26.8 x 31.2 cm

Mad in Bedlam. ... Lettering continues: "His fortune ruin'd, frenzy wrecks his mind, in Bedlam view th'unhappy wretch confind! Behold the kind companion of his woe, whose tears of symphathizing pity flow. What varied lunacys engage our eyes? The moaping lover breaths eternal sighs, the echoing roof the wretch dispairing rends, th' astronomer his tube and schemes attends, sceptre & crown'd wth. straw the monarch rules, the pope his pardons breathes, & thundring bulls, the cross-leg'd taylor seems to ply his trade, and frantick airs are by the fidler play'd."

This print is plate VIII (the final one in the series) to Hogarth's, A rake's progress first published in 1735

British Museum, Catalogue of political and personal satires, vol. III, pt. 1, London 1877, no. 2248

R. Paulson, Hogarth's graphic works, 3 ed., London 1989, no. 139

Wellcome Collection 20045i