--Pars minima est ipsa puella sui.
OVID, Rem. Amor. 344.
* * * * *
_Sheer Lane, January 4._
The court being prepared for proceeding on the cause of the petticoat, I
gave orders to bring in a criminal who was taken up as she went out of
the puppet-show about three nights ago, and was now standing in the
street with a great concourse of people about her. Word was brought me,
that she had endeavoured twice or thrice to come in, but could not do it
by reason of her petticoat, which was too large for the entrance of my
house, though I had ordered both the folding-doors to be thrown open for
its reception. Upon this, I desired the jury of matrons, who stood at my
right hand, to inform themselves of her condition, and know whether
there were any private reasons why she might not make her appearance
separate from her petticoat. This was managed with great discretion, and
had such an effect, that upon the return of the verdict from the bench
of matrons, I issued out an order forthwith, that the criminal should be
stripped of her encumbrances, till she became little enough to enter my
house. I had before given directions for an engine of several legs, that
could contract or open itself like the top of an umbrello,[10] in order
to place the petticoat upon it, by which means I might take a leisurely
survey of it, as it should appear in its proper dimensions. This was all
done accordingly; and forthwith, upon the closing of the engine, the
petticoat was brought into court. I then directed the machine to be set
upon the table, and dilated in such a manner as to show the garment in
its utmost circumference; but my great hall was too narrow for the
experiment; for before it was half unfolded, it described so immoderate
a circle, that the lower part of it brushed upon my face as I sate in my
chair of judicature. I then inquired for the person that belonged to the
petticoat; and to my great surprise, was directed to a very beautiful
young damsel, with so pretty a face and shape, that I bid her come out
of the crowd, and seated her upon a little crock at my left hand. "My
pretty maid," said I, "do you own yourself to have been the inhabitant
of the garment before us?" The girl I found had good sense, and told me
with a smile, that notwithstanding it was her own petticoat, she should
be very glad to see an example made of it; and that she wore it for no
other reason, but that she had a mind to look as big and burly as other
persons of her quality; that she had kept out of it as long as she
could, and till she began to appear little in the eyes of all her
acquaintance; that if she laid it aside, people would think she was not
made like other women. I always give great allowances to the fair sex
upon account of the fashion, and therefore was not displeased with the
defence of my pretty criminal. I then ordered the vest which stood
before us to be drawn up by a pulley to the top of my great hall, and
afterwards to be spread open by the engine it was placed upon, in such a
manner, that it formed a very splendid and ample canopy over our heads,
and covered the whole court of judicature with a kind of silken rotunda,
in its form not unlike the cupola of St. Paul's. I entered upon the
whole cause with great satisfaction as I sat under the shadow of it.
The counsel for the petticoat was now called in, and ordered to produce
what they had to say against the popular cry which was raised against
it. They answered the objections with great strength and solidity of
argument, and expatiated in very florid harangues, which they did not
fail to set off and furbelow (if I may be allowed the metaphor) with
many periodical sentences and turns of oratory. The chief arguments for
their client were taken, first, from the great benefit that might arise
to our woollen manufactury from this invention, which was calculated as
follows: the common petticoat has not above four yards in the
circumference; whereas this over our heads had more in the
semi-diameter; so that by allowing it twenty-four yards in the
circumference, the five millions of woollen petticoats, which (according
to Sir William Petty) supposing what ought to be supposed in a
well-governed state, that all petticoats are made of that stuff, would
amount to thirty millions of those of the ancient mode. A prodigious
improvement of the woollen trade! and what could not fail to sink the
power of France in a few years.
To introduce the second argument, they begged leave to read a petition
of the ropemakers, wherein it was represented, that the demand for
cords, and the price of them, were much risen since this fashion came
up. At this, all the company who were present lifted up their eyes into
the vault; and I must confess, we did discover many traces of cordage
which were interwoven in the stiffening of the drapery.
A third argument was founded upon a petition of the Greenland trade,
which likewise represented the great consumption of whalebone which
would be occasioned by the present fashion, and the benefit which would
thereby accrue to that branch of the British trade.
To conclude, they gently touched upon the weight and unwieldiness of the
garment, which they insinuated might be of great use to preserve the
honour of families.
These arguments would have wrought very much upon me (as I then told the
company in a long and elaborate discourse) had I not considered the
great and additional expense which such fashions would bring upon
fathers and husbands; and therefore by no means to be thought of till
some years after a peace. I further urged, that it would be a prejudice
to the ladies themselves, who could never expect to have any money in
the pocket, if they laid out so much on the petticoat. To this I added,
the great temptation it might give to virgins, of acting in security
like married women, and by that means give a check to matrimony, an
institution always encouraged by wise societies.
At the same time, in answer to the several petitions produced on that
side, I showed one subscribed by the women of several persons of
quality, humbly setting forth, that since the introduction of this mode,
their respective ladies had, instead of bestowing on them their cast
gowns, cut them into shreds, and mixed them with the cordage and
buckram, to complete the stiffening of their under-petticoats. For
which, and sundry other reasons, I pronounced the petticoat a
forfeiture: but to show that I did not make that judgment for the sake
of filthy lucre, I ordered it to be folded up, and sent it as a present
to a widow gentlewoman, who has five daughters, desiring she would make
each of them a petticoat out of it, and send me back the remainder,
which I design to cut into stomachers, caps, facings of my waistcoat
sleeves, and other garnitures suitable to my age and quality.
I would not be understood, that, while I discard this monstrous
invention, I am an enemy to the proper ornaments of the fair sex. On
the contrary, as the hand of nature has poured on them such a profusion
of charms and graces, and sent them into the world more amiable and
finished than the rest of her works; so I would have them bestow upon
themselves all the additional beauties that art can supply them with,
provided it does not interfere with, disguise, or pervert, those of
nature.
I consider woman as a beautiful romantic animal, that may be adorned
with furs and feathers, pearls and diamonds, ores and silks. The lynx
shall cast its skin at her feet to make her a tippet; the peacock,
parrot, and swan, shall pay contributions to her muff; the sea shall be
searched for shells, and the rocks for gems; and every part of nature
furnish out its share towards the embellishment of a creature that is
the most consummate work of it. All this I shall indulge them in; but as
for the petticoat I have been speaking of, I neither can, nor will allow
it.
[Footnote 10: Swift uses this form of the word: "It served him for a
nightcap when he went to bed, and for an umbrello in rainy whether."]
No. 117. [ADDISON.
From _Thursday, Jan. 5_, to _Saturday, Jan. 7, 1709-10_.
Durate, et vosmet rebus servate secundis.
VIRG., AEn. i. 207.
* * * * *
_Sheer Lane, January 6._
When I look into the frame and constitution of my own mind, there is no
part of it which I observe with greater satisfaction, than that
tenderness and concern which it bears for the good and happiness of
mankind. My own circumstances are indeed so narrow and scanty, that I
should taste but very little pleasure, could I receive it only from
those enjoyments which are in my own possession; but by this great
tincture of humanity, which I find in all my thoughts and reflections,
I am happier than any single person can be, with all the wealth,
strength, beauty, and success, that can be conferred upon a mortal, if
he only relishes such a proportion of these blessings as is vested in
himself, and is his own private property. By this means, every man that
does himself any real service, does me a kindness. I come in for my
share in all the good that happens to a man of merit and virtue, and
partake of many gifts of fortune and power that I was never born to.
There is nothing in particular in which I so much rejoice, as the
deliverance of good and generous spirits out of dangers, difficulties,
and distresses. And because the world does not supply instances of this
kind to furnish out sufficient entertainments for such a humanity and
benevolence of temper, I have ever delighted in reading the history of
ages past, which draws together into a narrow compass the great
occurrences and events that are but thinly sown in those tracts of time
which lie within our own knowledge and observation. When I see the life
of a great man, who has deserved well of his country, after having
struggled through all the oppositions of prejudice and envy, breaking
out with lustre, and shining forth in all the splendour of success, I
close my book, and am a happy man for a whole evening.
But since in history events are of a mixed nature, and often happen
alike to the worthless and the deserving, insomuch that we frequently
see a virtuous man dying in the midst of disappointments and calamities,
and the vicious ending their days in prosperity and peace, I love to
amuse myself with the accounts I meet with in fabulous histories and
fictions: for in this kind of writings we have always the pleasure of
seeing vice punished, and virtue rewarded. Indeed, were we able to view
a man in the whole circle of his existence, we should have the
satisfaction of seeing it close with happiness or misery, according to
his proper merit: but though our view of him is interrupted by death
before the finishing of his adventures (if I may so speak), we may be
sure that the conclusion and catastrophe is altogether suitable to his
behaviour. On the contrary, the whole being of a man, considered as a
hero, or a knight-errant, is comprehended within the limits of a poem or
romance, and therefore always ends to our satisfaction; so that
inventions of this kind are like food and exercise to a good-natured
disposition, which they please and gratify at the same time that they
nourish and strengthen. The greater the affliction is in which we see
our favourites in these relations engaged, the greater is the pleasure
we take in seeing them relieved.
Among the many feigned histories which I have met with in my reading,
there is none in which the hero's perplexity is greater, and the winding
out of it more difficult, than that in a French author whose name I have
forgot. It so happens, that the hero's mistress was the sister of his
most intimate friend, who for certain reasons was given out to be dead,
while he was preparing to leave his country in quest of adventures. The
hero having heard of his friend's death, immediately repaired to his
mistress, to condole with her, and comfort her. Upon his arrival in her
garden, he discovered at a distance a man clasped in her arms, and
embraced with the most endearing tenderness. What should he do? It did
not consist with the gentleness of a knight-errant either to kill his
mistress, or the man whom she was pleased to favour. At the same time,
it would have spoiled a romance, should he have laid violent hands on
himself. In short, he immediately entered upon his adventures; and after
a long series of exploits, found out by degrees, that the person he saw
in his mistress's arms was her own brother, taking leave of her before
he left his country, and the embrace she gave him nothing else but the
affectionate farewell of a sister: so that he had at once the two
greatest satisfactions that could enter into the heart of man, in
finding his friend alive, whom he thought dead; and his mistress
faithful, whom he had believed inconstant.
There are indeed some disasters so very fatal, that it is impossible for
any accidents to rectify them. Of this kind was that of poor Lucretia;
and yet we see Ovid has found an expedient even in this case. He
describes a beautiful and royal virgin walking on the seashore, where
she was discovered by Neptune, and violated after a long and
unsuccessful importunity. To mitigate her sorrow, he offers her whatever
she would wish for. Never certainly was the wit of woman more puzzled in
finding out a stratagem to retrieve her honour. Had she desired to be
changed into a stock or stone, a beast, fish or fowl, she would have
been a loser by it: or had she desired to have been made a sea-nymph, or
a goddess, her immortality would but have perpetuated her disgrace.
"Give me therefore," said she, "such a shape as may make me incapable of
suffering again the like calamity, or of being reproached for what I
have already suffered." To be short, she was turned into a man, and by
that only means avoided the danger and imputation she so much dreaded.
I was once myself in agonies of grief that are unutterable, and in so
great a distraction of mind, that I thought myself even out of the
possibility of receiving comfort. The occasion was as follows: When I
was a youth in a part of the army which was then quartered at Dover, I
fell in love with an agreeable young woman, of a good family in those
parts, and had the satisfaction of seeing my addresses kindly received,
which occasioned the perplexity I am going to relate.
We were in a calm evening diverting ourselves upon the top of the cliff
with the prospect of the sea, and trifling away the time in such little
fondnesses as are most ridiculous to people in business, and most
agreeable to those in love.
In the midst of these our innocent endearments, she snatched a paper of
verses out of my hand, and ran away with them. I was following her, when
on a sudden the ground, though at a considerable distance from the verge
of the precipice, sank under her, and threw her down from so prodigious
a height upon such a range of rocks, as would have dashed her into ten
thousand pieces, had her body been made of adamant. It is much easier
for my reader to imagine my state of mind upon such an occasion, than
for me to express it. I said to myself, "It is not in the power of
heaven to relieve me!" when I awoke, equally transported and astonished,
to see myself drawn out of an affliction which the very moment before
appeared to me altogether inextricable.
The impressions of grief and horror were so lively on this occasion,
that while they lasted, they made me more miserable than I was at the
real death of this beloved person (which happened a few months after, at
a time when the match between us was concluded), inasmuch as the
imaginary death was untimely, and I myself in a sort an accessory;
whereas her real decease had at least these alleviations, of being
natural and inevitable.
The memory of the dream I have related still dwells so strongly upon me,
that I can never read the description of Dover Cliff in Shakespeare's
tragedy of "King Lear,"[11] without a fresh sense of my escape. The
prospect from that place is drawn with such proper incidents, that
whoever can read it without growing giddy, must have a good head, or a
very bad one.
"_Come on, sir, here's the place; stand still! How fearful
And dizzy 'tis to cast one's eyes so low?
The crows and choughs that wing the midway air,
Show scarce as gross as beetles. Half-way down
Hangs one that gathers samphire. Dreadful trade!
Methinks he seems no bigger than his head.
The fishermen that walk upon the beach,
Appear like mice, and yond' tall anchoring bark
Diminished to her boat;[12] her boat![12] a buoy
Almost too small for sight. The murmuring surge
(That on the unnumbered idle pebble beats)
Cannot be heard so high. I'll look no more,
Lest my brain turn._"[13]
[Footnote 11: "King Lear," act iv. sc. 6.]
[Footnote 12: Altered from Shakespeare's "cock."]
[Footnote 13: "The parcel of letters, value 10_s._ 3_d._, with the
subsequent letter, is received, for which Mr. Bickerstaff gives his
thanks and humble service" (folio).]