Artist, attributed to: Philip Dawe, British, ca. 1750-ca. 1790, Publisher: Robert Sayer, British, 1725-1794, Publisher: James M. Bennett, American, active mid-late 18th century, The Bostonians Paying the Excise-Man or Tarring and Feathering, Plate 1 of6, Mezzotint with some burin work, sheet: 47.3 × 29.5 cm (18 5/8 × 11 5/8in.), Political tension had been brewing between the American colonists and Great Britain for several years when it finally reached the boiling point over the Tea Act of 1773. With this legislation, Parliament granted the struggling English East India Company a monopoly on all tea imported to America. The colonists expressed their bitter discontent through a boycott. In the foreground of this print, five irate Bostonians force tea down the throat of a tarred-and-feathered man, purportedly John Malcomb, commissioner of customs for the Crown. In the background, still more protestors throw crates of tea into Boston Harbor—a reference to the events of December 16, 1773