[1] In the 1770s he began acting and singing in plays at the Haymarket Theatre, Covent Garden, and Sadler’s Wells while at the same time training and exhibiting at the Royal Academy, whose school he entered in 1772.

This was the heyday of the so-called 'droll' mezzotint (amusing prints based on social situations rather than political or topical events)[3] and Dighton's designs, executed in watercolour and then engraved, were an integral part of Bowles’s stock.

In awkward poses with ruddy faces, Dighton's satirical caricatures included lawyers, military officers, actors and actresses, and even down-at-heel types.

By the start of the century, his success allowed him to open a shop in Charing Cross, where he sold his own prints and those of others until it emerged in 1806 that part of his stock was stolen from the British Museum.

[7] Because of his co-operation, Dighton escaped prosecution, but he was forced to lie low in Oxford until the scandal died down.