Masking

“ Overall, our study underlines the importance of intensity measures in the field as source level plays a crucial and so far largely underestimated role in bat echolocation. If we want to further understand which ecological and evolutionary factors shape echolocation signal design, an even larger variety of call parameters need to be considered, including sound duration and pulse interval, which may create call-echo overlap or other masking effects. ”

“ A mask will enable me to substitute for the face of some common-place player, or for that face repainted to suit his own vulgar fancy, the fine invention of a sculptor, and to bring the audience close enough to the play to hear every inflection of the voice. A mask never seems but a dirty face, and no matter how close you go is still a work of art; nor shall we lose by staying the movement of the features, for deep feeling is expressed by a movement of the whole body. ”

“ Pshaw! a mask makes people but the more inquisitive, and is as ridiculous a disguise as a stage-beard: her shape, stature, habit will be known. And if we should meet with Horner, he would be sure to take acquaintance with us, must wish her joy, kiss her, talk to her, leer upon her, and the devil and all. No, I'll not use her to a mask, 'tis dangerous; for masks have made more cuckolds than the best faces that ever were known. ”

“ In this City of Masks there are hundreds of men and women in whose veins the blood of a sound aristocracy flows. By choice or necessity they have donned the mask of obscurity. They tread the paths of oblivion. They toil, beg or steal to keep pace with circumstance. But the blood will not be denied. In the breast of each of these drifters throbs the pride of birth, in the soul of each flickers the unquenchable flame of caste. The mask is for the man outside, not for the man inside. ”

“ He has always worn twelve new masks every year, inasmuch as no mask can endure for many nights the near brightness of his face, before which even a mask of the best and purest silver soon tarnishes and wears away. ”

“ Its men and women hide behind a million masks; no man looks beneath the mask his neighbour wears, for he is interested only in that which he sees with the least possible effort: the surface. He sees his neighbour but he knows him not. He keeps his own mask in place and wanders among the millions, secure in the thought that all other men are as casual as he,—and as charitable.
From time to time the newspapers come forward with stories that amaze and interest those of us who remain, and always will remain, romantic and impressionable. ”

“ Any sort of mask can be put on any sort of face. Anybody can learn certain phrases or state verbally that he holds certain views. I can go out into the street and state that I am a Wesleyan Methodist or a Sandemanian, though I fear in no very convincing accent. But we are talking about an artist; and for the enjoyment of the artist the mask must be to some extent moulded on the face. What he makes outside him must correspond to something inside him; he can only make his effects out of some of the materials of his soul. ”

“ From nearly every walk in life they came to this common, converging point, and sat them down with their equals, for the moment laying aside the mask to take up a long-discarded and perhaps despised reality. ”

“ But I can't believe it was all a malicious prank. I just can't reconcile what I saw with any such convenient, easy-to-accept explanation. You've convinced yourself that the figure in the hall was wearing a mask. It was the first thing I thought of, but I couldn't go on believing it."
"Why not? It makes sense."
"Not to me. That creature was real, David. Real and alive and a monster. Not a man disguised by a mask. Its face had a fleshly look."
"But you said yourself that its face was masklike. And modern mechanical masks can be almost unbelievably lifelike. Mask-making has become a fine art. ”

“ There was a time when the mask was not worn for the assault. And I remember reading some time ago in the Encyclopaedia, published about the middle of last century (1755) , under the word mask the following remarks:—
‘In foil-play Fencers have sometimes carried precaution so far as to wear a mask, to protect themselves from possible hits in the face. It is true that those who have acquired little skill in the Art may chance to wound their Adversary by a clumsy thrust, or cause themselves to be wounded by throwing up the point with a bad parry. ”

“ W. W. Story, in writing of the life-mask of Washington, says of life-masks generally: “Indeed a mask from the living face, though it repeats exactly the true forms of the original, lacks the spirit and expression of the real person. But this is not always the case. The more mobile and variable the face, the more the mask loses; the more set and determined the character and expression, the more perfectly the work reproduces it.”
xvThe procedure of taking a mould of the living face is not pleasant to the subject. ”

“ There he goes—trying to swagger as he pushes off through the crowd. They're all looking at me, those masks, like a lot of great birds without faces, horrid, rather! The little lady is looking up at me. I can just see the smile of her mouth underneath her white silk mask as she speaks—'Grazie inespressible, Sior Maschera Inglese!' I must be masked as well then—of course, she can guess I'm English. She's accidentally knocked off her mask! I say, such a beautiful roguish face! ”

“ Well, I thought, somehow, that if everybody was allowed to dress in character and wear some sort of a mask, the one who had played such pranks and frightened Grace and the maids might be found out. If anybody in this house owns such a mask as that horrid one and is mean enough to scare little girls, he or she wouldn’t lose so good a chance of scaring a lot more. ”

“ But no one with a practised eye can fail to see that in this case the mask—for mask it is—covers an earnest and a suffering countenance. The mask is that of a hermit; pluck it off, and there still remains a man of a solitary nature! The mask is grandiose melancholy ”

“ Little bunches of maskers, and single maskers danced and strutted along in the thick flow under the trees. If you are a mask you don't walk like a human being: you dance and prance along extraordinarily like the life-size marionettes, conducted by wires from above. ”

“ Observation and experiment will guide you in the painting of the eyes, lips, brow, and hair, and also in the subtle violet shadows about the eyes, cheeks, and chin. Beware of timid lines that imitate nature. They say very little when the mask is a few feet away from you. Big, 166sweeping rhythmic lines make for design and carrying power, and are to be seen in all great masks. The inside of the mask should also be painted, decorated if you like, and shellacked when the oil paint is thoroughly dry. This prevents the breath from softening the papier-mâché. The outside must not be shellacked. ”

“ One especially caught her fancy as her preoccupied glance was held by it—a small egg of silver gilt, the front finely carved into the likeness of a mask, with smoothly banded hair and sleepy eyes and smiling lips.
"Like me!" she thought. "My face is but a mask gilt with smiles. ”

“ A mask tells us more than a face. ”

“ The mask of a tragic lady had all those signs of a genuine female in distress which are even to this day required on the stage, where long black hair, in terribly straightened circumstances, is the emblem of an anxious mind, which has long been a stranger to curl-papers. When insanity, as well as anguish, had to be represented by the mask, the hair was undivided in the centre, but floated in wild profusion, as if the wearer had gone through a great deal, and as if, whatever she had gone through, her hair had caught in the middle of. ”

“ For occasions such as the New Year and April Fools’ Day the mask may express an individual idea or fancy. There are a few days, however, such as Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Easter, for which 153masks must be specially designed. These masks should represent the characters that one associates with the occasions. When a story is woven about these characters and then told in pantomime, by actors wearing masks, it may be called a mask. Music and dance add much to the beauty of a mask. ”

“ The Map of the Mask From the map it is evident that masks have been worn in every part of the world. They are older than the idols which primitive man made for himself. Why he invented masks we do not exactly know. They may have originated when man first attempted to impersonate the gods as he sought to control nature. ”

“ I made a tour of the room; twenty masks called me by name and told me theirs. These were all leaders—aristocrats and merchants—in the undignified disguise of pierrots, of postilions, of merry-andrews, or of fishwives. They were all young people of family, of culture, of talent ”

“ Hence the masks in a large tribe will exhibit a great variety of patterns. Great care is taken that no one shall see the mask, for it is very important that the identity of the owner shall be concealed. When the work is finished, the owner puts his mark on it, and takes it to the mask-house. When the time comes for the parade of the masks, the champions put them on, having arrayed themselves for the occasion in red shirts of bark, and skirts reaching to their knees. ”

“ A veil may be needful, but never a mask. Instances of people who wear masks in all classes of society, and never take them off even in the most familiar moments, though sometimes they may chance to slip aside. ”

“ Lat. mascus, masca, spectre, through Ital. maschera, Span. mascara) , a covering for the face, taking various forms, used either as a protective screen or as a disguise. In the latter sense masks are mostly associated with the artificial faces worn by actors in dramatic representations, or assumed for exciting terror (e.g. in savage rites) . The spelling “masque,” representing the same word, is now in English used more specially for certain varieties of drama in which masks were originally worn (see Drama) ”

“ All are filled with maskers habited in every device of quaint disguisement. Not a face or form is to be recognised. See how rapidly the fairy fleet cleaves the water, now dashing into deep shadows, now lingering in the torchlight that glances on the rich silks and grotesque features of the maskers. ”

“ Occasions for Wearing the Mask We all know the thrill of wearing a mask, but an entirely new and strange thrill awaits him who wears a mask of his own creation. Anyone who has imagination is apt to turn away from the ordinary commercial mask, because his fancy can picture something much more clever and interesting.
When one looks at the calendar he is surprised to find that there are so many days that invite the wearing of masks. The first occasion for wearing a mask that comes to mind is Hallowe’en, that old celebration of the eve of All Saints’ Day. ”

“ A masker attired as a scarlet devil had climbed into the hood, and was now perched close behind her. She shook her head at him; but he only shook his in return, and chattered and grimaced, and bent over till his fiery mask almost grazed her shoulder. ”

“ You must bear to be surrounded with masks, instead of the human face divine; and instead of fellow-creatures, you must content yourself with puppets. You will have the amusement of pulling the wires: but remember that you must wear a mask perpetually as well as others, and never attempt to speak, and never expect to hear the language of truth or of the heart. ”

“ The mask was formerly worn by men who were ashamed of their employment, and who had the same reasons for anonymity as a thief or an anarchist may have for a disguise. It may now be worn even by men who are proud of their profession, because the mask has a different significance. ”

“ The mask has, at all times, been the essential complement of the domino. In its ordinary form it consists of a stifle shape arranged to fit the face as far as the upper lip. Moulded to the nose, it is provided with slits for the eyes and nostrils, and fastened by means of a button and a narrow elastic band. Now and then it is edged with a frill of lace which conceals the chin and further enhances the disguise. Black satin and velvet are most frequently employed to cover this kind of mask, the latter, by the way, being far more becoming ”

“ We wear masks, we inherit generations of masks; and a trivial incident reveals the primordial which lurks in each one of us. Savages—Kitty with her stone hatchet and Hawksley swinging the curved blade of Rurik. ”

“ What can be duller than a parcel of masks moving about the streets and looking as grave and monotonous as possible from day to day, and with the same lifeless formality in their limbs and gestures as in their features? ”

“ Their masks and their costume must have been copied from these carnival scenes. We see their strongly-featured masks; their attitudes, pliant as those of a posture-master; the drollery of their figures; while the grotesque creatures seem to leap, and dance, and gesticulate, and move about so fantastically under his sharp graver, that they form as individualised a race as our fairies and witches; mortals, yet like nothing mortal! [40]
The first Italian actors wore masks—objections have been raised against their use. ”

“ The buckskin masks, without plumes or collars, are kept in a sack by the shaman, and he carries them on horseback to the place where the rites are to be performed: there they are freshly painted, and the collars and plumes are added just before they are to be used in the ceremony.
105. Plates IV. and VII. show the masks as they are actually worn, and exhibit men as they are dressed and painted to represent the War Gods. In plate I. we get representations of these masks as they are depicted in the dry-paintings. ”

“ The teacher of the portrait class and his pupils would hardly have recognized their model; the stranger on the hillside might not at once have identified the {62} newsboy. For model and newsboy, having laid aside the masks of the day which so often in New York persons find it necessary to wear,—- the tragic mask, the comic mask, the callous, coarse, brutal mask, the mask of the human pack, the mask of the human sty,—model and newsboy reappeared at home with each other as nearly what in truth they were as the denials of life would allow. ”