The Reward of Cruelty. Engraving of a felon's fate, 'The Reward of Cruelty' by the English artist William Hogarth (1697-1764). The engraving shows the corpse of the executed murderer Tom Nero (lower centre) being dissected on the table at Surgeon's Hall. As onlookers watch entrails are removed from the corpse, some of the entrails are eaten by a dog (bottom centre). The rope used to execute Nero is still around his neck. This was the last in a series of four engravings entitled 'The Four Stages of Cruelty'. Hogarth intended these engravings, especially the final one to shock likely miscreants into an awareness of the wages of sin.