1.Vide Hassell’s Microscopic Anatomy. Haller says “Withof calculated that the hair of the Beard grows at the rate of 1½ line in the week, which is 6½ inches in the year, and by the time a man reaches eighty, 27 feet will have fallen under the edge of the razor.”

2.The whiskers of Confucius are said to be preserved as relics in China.

3.I can from personal experience state, that being subject when younger to swelling of the upper lip from cold, previous to entering Switzerland I allowed my moustache to grow. During six weeks excursion on foot, exposed to all weathers and stopping for none, being at one moment in warm valleys and a few hours afterwards at the top of ice-clad mountains, I never felt the least uncomfortableness about the mouth. When on returning home, however, I was foolish enough to shave, I paid dearly for the operation.

4.Elmes says, “The Beard in Art has an ideal character as an attribute, and distinguished by its undulating curl the Beard of Jupiter Olympius from that of Jupiter Serapis (who has a longer and straighter Beard) the lank Beard of Neptune and the river Gods, from the short and frizzly Beards of Hercules, Ajax, Diomede, Ulysses, &c.”

5.“It is customary to shave the Ottoman Princes as a mark of subjection to the reigning Sultan; and those who serve in the Seraglio have their Beards shaven as a sign of servitude, and do not suffer it to grow till the Sultan has set them at liberty.”—Burder’s Oriental Customs. Volney says, “At length Ibrahim Bey suffered Ali his page to let his Beard grow, i.e., gave him his freedom, for among the Turks to want the Beard is thought only fit for slaves and women.”

6.Dr. Wolff says, Mahomed Effendi told him “that the Mahomedans believed that though Noah lived 1000 years, no hair of his blessed Beard fell off, or became white; while that of the Devil consists only of one long hair;” and the same Mahomed, wishing to compliment two midshipmen, “hoped they would some day have fine long Beards like himself.”

7.Niebuhr says, “I once saw, in a caravan, an Arab highly offended at a man who had accidentally bespattered his Beard. It was with difficulty he could be appeased, even though the offender humbly asked his pardon, and kissed his Beard in token of submission.” Though I avoided breaking the argument by its insertion under the account of the Jews, it may be interesting to state, that Moses, in Numbers, orders a man to be considered unclean for seven days, whose Beard has been defiled in this way: and that David could scarcely have devised a more efficient means to convince Achish of his madness, than the expedient he adopted of allowing his saliva to descend upon his Beard.

8.It used to be considered one of the almost impossible feats of Chivalry to pluck a hair from the Sultan’s Beard.—(May the Russians find it quite so!) The romance of Oberon is founded on this notion, and Shakspeare makes Benedict say in a spirit of bravado, “I’ll fetch you a hair off the great Cham’s Beard.” (i.e. Khan of Tartary’s Beard.)

9.The Rev. John More, of Norwich, a worthy clergyman in Elizabeth’s reign, who is said to have had the longest and largest Beard of any Englishman of his time, seems to have chosen this Spartan for his model; since when asked to give a reason for it he replied, “that no act of his life might be unworthy of the gravity of his appearance.” And Baudinus, quoted by Pagenstecher, says, Frederick Taubman, the celebrated German wit, humourist, and theologian, being asked the same question answered, “in order that whenever I behold these hairs, I may remember that I am no vile coward or old woman, but a man, called Frederick Taubman.”

10.That the Beard, however, sometimes afforded a handle to an enemy in ancient times, when swords, especially the Greek, were very short, is admitted. And I possess an engraving from one of Raphael’s Vatican Cartoons, where one soldier is represented in the act of cutting down another whom he has seized by the Beard. He must be a poor master of his weapon, however, who in modern times would allow a man to grasp his Beard without being hewn down or run through in the process.

11.Suetonius says, “he was excessively nice about his body, that he was not only sheered and shaved, but plucked.”

12.Besides shaving, the Romans as they progressed in luxurious effeminacy, used depilatories, tweezers and all sorts of contrivances to make themselves as little like men and as much like women as possible; and their satirists abound with passages impossible to quote with decency on the causes and consequences of this abrogation of the distinctive peculiarities of the two sexes.

13.Pagenstecher says, “one of the Emperors of Rome refused to admit to an audience certain Ambassadors of the Veneti, because they had no Beards.”

14.The branch of the Roman family to which Nero belonged was called Enobarbus, copper-coloured or red Beard; and the legend of the family was, that the Dioscuri announced to one of their ancestors a victory, and to confirm the truth of what was said, stroked his black hair and Beard, and turned them red. Cn. Domitius, who was Censor with L. Crassus the orator, “took” says Pagenstecher, “too much pride in his,” and Crassus fired away the following epigram upon it. “Quid mirum si barbam habet aeneam Domitius cum et os ferreum et cor habet plumbeum.” (Where’s the wonder Domitius has a brazen Beard, when he has bones of iron and a heart of lead.) Shakspeare (the unlearned!) who never loses a characteristic, makes his Enobarbus, (who was great grandfather of Nero, wore a Beard, as seen on his medals, and was a fine bold warrior,) speak thus of Antony, under the fascination of Cleopatra:—

This passage evidently associates the Beard with manly determination, and shaving with the want of it, for subsequently Enobarbus speaks of Antony’s effeminacy in these words:—

15.Arcite in Chaucer’s Knight’s Tale thus devotes his Beard to Mars:—

16.The Goths and Dacians, as seen on the Roman monuments, were Bearded; and the ancient Hungarians, Raumer states, wore long Beards adorned with gold and jewels. The Catti also were accustomed not to trim the hair of the head or Beard till they had proved their manliness by slaying an enemy in battle.

17.One of the Legends of King Arthur mentions a giant who made “a great exhibition of domestic manufacture,” consisting of a “cloak fringed with the Beards of kings.”

18.Many princes have borne the title of Bearded—as the Greek Emperor Constantine Pogonatus, Count Godfrey, the Emperor Barbarossa, and Eberhard Duke of Wirtemberg in the reign of Maximilian, whose wisdom might truly be said to have grown with his Beard, and on whom the following verse was made:—

19.

20.Judas der Ertz. Schelm.

21.A writer in Dickens’ Household Words says Pope Anacletus, (query 1st or 2nd) was the first who introduced the custom of shaving.

22.In this and in other places I am obliged to leave under a veil of obscure allusion, arguments of thrilling force, not only from ancient but from our own history: matters not to be met with in ordinary histories; but too abundant in the pages of satirists and moralists, who were hardy enough to lash the prevalent follies and vices of the times in which they lived.

23.I trust my honest and uncompromising brother Beard will pardon the liberty I have taken with his name. No one can be a more sincere admirer than myself of the manly way in which he maintains his opinions on all occasions, and the humorous kindness of disposition which renders him beloved in private and in public. I should always esteem him as a public man, were it only for his long and single-handed fight against that economical iniquity—that suicidal tax on prudence and foresight, and bounty on improvidence—the Fire Insurance Duty!

24.“She had,” says D’Israeli, “for her marriage dower the rich province of Poitou and Guyenne; and this was the origin of those wars which for 300 years ravaged France, and cost the French three million of men. All which probably had never occurred had Louis VII not been so rash as to crop his head and shave his Beard, by which he became so disgustful in the eyes of our Queen Eleanor.”

25.No true Scotchman would pardon me if I omitted to note that the brave Wallace had “a most brave Beard.”

26.Southey in “The Doctor” mentions the Beard of Dominico d’Ancona, as the crown or King of Beards,

and of which Berni says, “that the Barber ought to have felt less reluctance in cutting the said Dominico’s throat, than in cutting off so incomparable a Beard.” But Southey is outdone by a story told by Dr. Ehle in his work on the hair, where mention is made of two seven-foot giants with Beards down to their toes, at the court of one of the German sovereigns. They both fell in love with the same woman, and their master decided that whichever should succeed in putting his rival into a sack, should have the maiden. One of them sacked the other after a long duel before the whole court, and married the girl. That the pair lived happily afterwards, as the Novelists say, is proved by their having as many signs of affection as there are in the Zodiac; and it is worthy of remark, both physiologically and astrologically, that the whole twelve were born under one sign, Gemini.

27.It surely will not be denied by any Judge of taste, that the Chancellor and other legal dignitaries would look more dignified in their own hair and with Beards of “reverend grey,” than in the present absurd, fantastic, unnatural and unbecoming frosted ivy bushes, with a black crow’s nest in the centre, in which Minerva might more readily mistake them for stray specimens of her favorite bird, the owl, than for learned, intelligent, and logical “sages of the law.”

28.Although an attempt was made in this reign to restrain the growth of legal Beards by some pragmatical heads of Lincoln’s Inn, who passed a resolution “that no fellow of that house should wear a Beard of above a fortnight’s growth;” and although transgression was punished with fine, loss of commons, and final expulsion, such was the vigorous resistance to this act of tyranny, that in the following year all previous orders respecting Beards were repealed. Percy Anecdotes.

About the same time also in Germany the moustache was partially substituted for the Beard, as appears by Berckemej’s Europ. Antiq. p. 294, who under the year 1564 says, the Archbishop Sigismund introduced in Magdeburgh the custom of shaving off the full Beard and wearing instead a moustache. The year in which this Beard-reformation (de-formation?) happened, was contained in this pentameter—

29.Pagenstecher asks “which was the city where Beard and foot made the magistrate?” and then proceeds gravely to relate that the inhabitants of Hardenberg had formerly the singular custom of electing their mayors or burgomasters by assembling at a round table, where while some of the town council were employed in inspecting their Beards, others were engaged in estimating their feet—the biggest Beard and largest foot being “called to the scarlet.” And rightly too! for the Beard denoted authority and wisdom, and the large foot an understanding likely to take grave steps when needed. As containing a valuable hint to modern corporations to look well to the essential points of a mayor—too often overlooked—I trust, this note upon note will be pardoned.

30.“Quip for an Upstart Courtier.”

31.A Ben Jonson, among other allusions to the Beard, has the following:—

In his Alchemist Subtle telling Drugger’s fortune says—

32.Lilly in one of his Dramas makes a Barber say to his customer, “How, sir, will you be trimmed? Will you have a Beard like a spade or a bodkin? A penthouse on your upper lip or an ally on your chin? Your moustaches sharp at the ends like shoemaker’s awls, or hanging down to your mouth like goat’s flakes?”

33.“In this reign, whiskers however attained to a high degree of favour at the expense of the expiring Beard, and continued so under Louis XIV, who, with all the great men of his court, took a great pride in wearing them. In those days of gallantry, it was no uncommon thing for a lover to have his whiskers turned up, combed and pomatumed by his mistress; and a man of fashion was always provided with every necessary article for this purpose, especially whisker wax.” Percy Anecdotes.

34.D’Israeli quotes an author of this reign, who in his “Elements of Education” says, “I have a favourable opinion of that young gentleman who is curious in fine moustachios. The time he employs in adjusting, dressing and curling them, is no lost time; for the more he contemplates his moustachios, the more his mind will cherish and be animated by masculine and courageous notions.”

D’Israeli also states, that the grandfather of Mrs. Thomas, the “Corinna of Dryden,” was very nice in the mode of that age, his valet being some hours every morning in starching his Beard and curling his whiskers, during which time he was always read to.

35.Taylor, the Water Poet, who lived from the end of Elizabeth to nearly the end of the Commonwealth, thus humorously describes the various fashions of this appendage.

36.

37.I cannot refrain from alluding in a note to a curious fact. On the day this Lecture was given, a little boy was brought to look at the portraits just after they were hung. I said to him, “Edward, which face do you like best?” He instantly touched the portrait of Addison, and said, “that’s the best woman,” and “that’s the best man!” pointing to the well-bearded face of Leonardo da Vinci.

38.That Southey had the same compunctious visitings as Addison, appears clearly enough, for while in his Doctor he compares “shaving at home” with “slavery abroad;” states that “a good razor is more difficult to meet with, than a good wife;” denounces the practice “as preposterous and irrational,” as “troublesome, inconvenient,” and attended with “discomfort, especially in frosty weather and March winds;” places it on an equality with the curse pronounced on Eve; and concludes with the opinion that “if the daily shavings of one year could be put into one shave, the operation would be more than flesh and blood could bear;” he has nothing to say in favour of shaving, but that it encourages Barbers, compels the shaver to some moments of calm thought and reflection, and enables him to draw lessons from the looking glass that nobody with razor in hand ever thought of. These words in another place give a key to his real opinion. “If I wore a Beard,” he writes, “I would cherish it as the Cid Campeador did his, for my pleasure. I would regale it on a Summer’s day with rose-water, and without making it an idol, I should sometimes offer incense to it with a pastille, or with lavender and sugar. My children, when they were young enough for such blandishments, would have delighted to comb and stroke and curl it, and my grandchildren in their time would have succeeded to the same course of mutual endearment.”

See also Leigh Hunt’s humourous paper on Lie-abeds in the Indicator, where he calls “shaving a villainous and unnecessary custom.”

39.Seume, a German poet of a better school, in his travels says, “To-day I threw my powder apparatus out of window, when will the day come that I can send my shaving apparatus after it!”

40.One hardly knows which is the most detestable, the canting hypocrisy of Prussian constitutional pretence,—the more open poltroonery of Neapolitan despotism—or the paternal care to prevent even the buddings of free thought as in Austria, where I can state from my own knowledge that Schiller’s works were seized as contraband on the Hungarian frontier, and a party in the Austrian service who had attempted to defend the conduct of the government at a Table d’HÔte was sent for by the head of the police, and when to excuse himself he alleged he was speaking for the government, was replied to—“Young man, the government want no defence—no discussion—and your wisest course is to be silent!”

41.There is something in the operation of shaving which, besides its painfulness, ought to make it repulsive to those who do not shave themselves—such as having the face bedaubed with lather and rubbed with a brush, which has done the same office for hundreds of chins. It is amusing to hear a knot of free and independent Englishmen roaring “Britons never will be slaves;” most of whom will give their chins to be mown and their noses to be pulled by any common Barber, and pay him too for the pulling. Even when the party is a self-shaver, to say nothing of the waste of time, what a number of petty annoyances and exercises of temper does it involve! Notwithstanding the boasts of cold water shavers, depend upon it in rigorous weather most people prefer hot to cold water, which renders them slaves to their servants; next, razors, as we know from puff advertisements and our own experience, are the most uncertain of articles; then there is the state of the nerves, that even the strongest cannot always control, causing the unsteady hand to gash and hack the chin, or cover it with blood from the beheading of those pimply eruptions of which the razor has been ofttimes the originator.

42.Old Burton in his Anatomy of Melancholy adds his quaint testimony. “No sooner doth a young man see his sweetheart coming, than he smugs up himself, pulls up his cloak, ties his garter points, sets his band and cuffs, sticks his hair, twires his Beard,” &c.

D’Israeli also says, “when the fair sex were accustomed to behold their lovers with Beards, the sight of a shaved chin excited feelings of horror and aversion; as much indeed as in this less heroic age would a gallant whose luxuriant Beard should ‘Stream like a meteor to the troubled air.’”

43.The whole dialogue from whence this phrase is taken, is suggestive of the contempt with which the ladies of Elizabeth and James the 1st’s time regarded a hairless chin. And there are numerous passages in our old Dramatists which might be quoted to the same effect, but that some of the allusions do not square with modern notions of delicacy.

44.It is scarcely conceivable what strange remarks have been made to me on the subject of the Beard. One party very gravely enquired whether I really thought that Adam had a Beard? Another was remonstrating with me on the first manifestations of my moustache; against whom I wickedly urged the argumentum ad feminam—you don’t object to it in the military? when the daughter naively chimed in, “why you know, Sir, it is natural to them!” Two or three acute persons, one of them a lawyer, have objected, “but you have your hair cut!” To which I have replied, “yes! but I don’t shave it off; and I trim my Beard instead of removing it. You also pare your nails; but you don’t think of plucking them out, do you?”