Analysis of information sources in references of the Wikipedia article "James Figg" in English language version.
Curator's comments: Elizabeth Einberg (personal communication, March 2011) suggests that the subject is likely to be James Figg rather than John Broughton. She also suggests that although the head in the painting was certainly the work of Hogarth, the landscape background was painted by George Lambert, and the body of the sitter perhaps by a third artist. Tony Gee (July 2016) also has some doubts as to whether the subject is actually Broughton.
It is 4:00 a.m. in a clubroom said to be St. John's Coffee-house, Shire Lane, London. The candles are burning out on a night consigned to drinking, and the revelers betray every state of drunkenness from rowdiness to stupefaction. In spite of Hogarth's admonition in his caption—"Think not to find one meant resemblance there, we lash the Vices but the Persons spare"—Hogarth's audience took delight in associating individuals in the print with various reprobates in London society.
