The title is a play on the drink sherry and the nickname of the playwright, theatre manager and politician Richard Brinsley Sheridan.

The Irish-born Sheridan had long associated with the Whig opposition, the print responded to a rambling speech he had recently made in the House of Commons against the Prime Minister William Pitt the Younger.

Following Pitt's death the following year Sheridan was made Treasurer of the Navy in the short-lived Ministry of All the Talents.

[1] Pitt is shown uncorking a bottle containing the head of Sheridan, releasing a series of old puns and attacks on the government.

[2] Pitt describes the opposition as like a newly opened bottle which "bursts all at once, into an explosion of froth and air".