File:I'm not drunk I'm angry. (And drunk) (18848568110).jpg

I must have been here a thousand times. But until we walked past on the Anti-Austerity march I'd never really noticed the group of statues in Aldwych in front of the entrance to St Clement Danes church.   Partly this is my automatic 'tuning-out' of Victorian monuments. Especially around Westminster there seem to be so many classically draped figures on plinths. Usually they are 'important' men in big hats. Sometimes on horses.   Here, the bloke on the top plinth is the nineteenth century British Prime Minister, William Ewart Gladstone. Of whom Queen Victoria said: "He speaks to me as if I were a public meeting."   Below Gladstone there's a supporting cast of other figures. My photo shows "Courage" - a woman wearing a lion's head pelt and wielding a curved-blade sword. She seems about to kill a snake which she grips with her left hand, just below its head. Her right knee pins the snake to the ground. A small child clings to her, the tip of the snake's tail curving round its leg.   Some wit - possibly one of the marchers? - has placed a handwritten cardboard placard in the snake's open mouth.

Left-click on the photo to see larger size and to pan.

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§ The sculptor was <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamo_Thornycroft" rel="nofollow">Hamo Thornycroft</a>. § See Bob Speel's website page on <a href="http://www.speel.me.uk/sculptlondon/gladstonememstrand.htm" rel="nofollow">The Gladstone Memorial in the Strand, London, by Hamo Thornycroft</a>.