Fanny Ellsler's last seranade or the soap-locks disgraceful attack upon the Germans

A riot scene: German parade musicians (possibly accompanying touring ballerina Fanny Elssler) are attacked and beaten with their own instruments by a gang of toughs (or "Soap-Locks" for the long, soaped hair locks fashionable among them) on a New York street. Onlookers watch from the windows of a nearby building. The cries of the assailants and their victims appear in the lower margin. They range from "Dam you I'll make you remember new years night," "Dam the Dutch!" and "This must be the fellow who shot Armstrong" (from the assailants) to "I am Murder'd" and "Fuerst, help! help!" (from the Germans). A man in the middle of the mob shouts, "I command the Peace." The less-than-sympathetic portrayal of the victims, and the scene's unmistakable comic undertones betray a definite anti-foreigner sentiment on the artist's part. The artist is Napoleon Sarony, judging from the print's pronounced stylistic and technical similarity to his "The New Era or the Effects of a Standing Army" (no. 1840-3). "Fanny Elssler's Last Serenade" was registered for copyright on August 17, 1840.
Entered . . . 1840 by H.R. Robinson.
Printed & published by H.R. Robinson, no. 52 Cortlandt St. New York.
Probably drawn by Napoleon Sarony.
Title appears as it is written on the item.
Weitenkampf, p. 69.
Forms part of: American cartoon print filing series (Library of Congress)
Published in: American political prints, 1766-1876 / Bernard F. Reilly. Boston : G.K. Hall, 1991, entry 1840-2.