Thomas S. Gowing

“ Cloth-breeches complains of the Barber's attention to Velvet-breeches in these terms. "His head being once dressed, which requires in combing and brushing some two hours; then being curiously washed with no worse than a camphor ball, you descend as low as his Beard, and ask whether he please to be shaven or no? whether he will have his peake cut short and sharp, amiable like an inamorato, or broad pendant like a spade, or le terrible, like a warrior or soldado? whether he will have his crates cut low like a juniper bush, or his subercles taken away with a razor? ”

“ Gresham the Merchant Prince, who found his Beard no hindrance to business; and the Poet of Poets, whether ancient or modern, Shakspeare.
As might be expected, the dramatic literature of the time is full of allusions to that feature which men still honored and admired. Lear can find no more pathetic outburst of insulted majesty, in addressing his vile daughter Goneril, than the words—
"Art not ashamed to look upon this Beard?" ”

“ 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 end like shoe-maker's awls, or hanging down to your mouth like goat's flakes?" ↑ 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 ”

“ It is to be hoped, that when any one for the future talks about the Beard being a foreign fashion, he will be reminded that it is a good old English natural fashion, and that the present custom of shaving was borrowed from France, at a time when we had no credit to borrow anything else, seeing that king, courtiers, and patriots, were al the pensioned dependents of the French monarch! ”

“ With every attempt at freedom on the Continent, the Beard re-appears; it was one of the most effective standards in the war of freedom, when Germany rose against Napoleon. In 1830, it was partially revived in France, and later still it has made many a perjured continental monarch [26] "quake and tremble in his capital," and reminded him that in spite of neglected promises and false oaths, the reign of injustice "hangs but on a hair," of which the police will not always be able to check the free growth. ”

“ Ladies by their very nature like every thing manly; and though from custom the Beard may at first sight have a strange look, they will soon be reconciled to it, and think, with Beatrice, that a man without, "is only fit to be their waiting gentlewoman." ”

“ When the brave John do Castro had taken the Indian fortress of Dieu, being in want of supplies, he pledged one of his moustaches for a thousand pistoles, saying "all the gold in the world cannot equal the value of this natural ornament of my valour." ”

“ The illustrious Alfred was so careful of the Beards of his subjects, that he inflicted the then heavy fine of twenty shillings on any one maliciously injuring the Beard of another. The Danes who invaded this country were Bearded. Fosbrooke says, some of them wore Beards with six forks, and history mentions Sueno the fork-beard. [3]
During this period, the French monarchy was growing. Its first kings held the Beard as sacred, and ornamented it with gold. Their subjects were proud of it as marking them out to be free men in contradistinction to the degenerate Roman population. ”

“ Harold, as representative of the real old English party, wore his Beard as shown by a cotemporary MSS, illuminator; but William the Conqueror, and most of his followers, are figured only with a moustache and their back hair close cropped or shaven. It was this barbarous fashion that induced Harold's spies to report to their master that the invaders were an army of Priests. ”

“ Henry's Queen Eleanor had been previously the wife of Louis VII, of France, who having been persuaded by his Priests to shave off his Beard, so disgusted Eleanor that she obtained a divorce. [9] Richard the Lion-hearted was Bearded like a lion, and though he was so absorbed in the Crusades that he did not redress, yet he acknowledged the justice of the complaints of the celebrated Longbeard, "Earl of London and King of the Poor," who did honor to his Beard by resisting oppression, and perished, after an heroic struggle, the victim of cowardice and treachery. ”

“ The last European nation to lay aside the Beard was the Russian, in whose ancient code it was enacted that whoever plucks hair from another's Beard shall be fined four times as much as for cutting off a finger. ”

“ 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. ”

“ Augustine is figured with his Beard on his appearance to convert these Islands in the sixth century. His followers must soon have shaved, because a writer of the seventh century, complains that "the Clergy had grown so corrupt as to be distinguished from the Laity less by their actions than by their want of Beards." ”

“ 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 di Vinci. ↑ That Southey had the same compunctions 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;" ”

“ Shakspeare makes Cressida say of Troilus's chin, "alas poor chin! many a wart is richer!" And Rosalind to Orlando, "I will pardon you for not having a neglected Beard, for truly your having in Beard is a younger brother's revenue." ”

“ 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! ↑ "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. ”

“ 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." ↑ 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. ”