“The grave Lord Chancellor[27] led the dance,
And seal and mace tripped down before him,”
Footnote 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.”
she, who was no prude, and had a right royal sympathy with every thing
manly and becoming, surrounded herself with men, who to the most
punctilious courtesy, joined the most adventurous spirit; and the Beard,
as might have been expected, grew and flourished mightily. Hence we are
not surprised at the wonderful efforts made by her subjects in arms, and
arts, and literature, so as to make her reign an era to which we look
back with patriotic pride, and from which our best writers still draw as
from a well of deep perennial flow.[28]
Footnote 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previous orders respecting Beards were repealed.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—
“Longa sIgIsMVnDo barba IVbente perIt.”
“Sigismund commanding, the long Beard perished in
MDLVV (= X) IIII. or 1564.”
A feeble reflection of some of the heads of this period were exhibited
on the walls of the lecture room, as the sagacious Burleigh; the
adventurous Raleigh; the rash but brave Essex; Nottingham, the High
Admiral who scattered the Armada; 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?”
and when Regan insults the faithful Gloster, the latter exclaims—
“By the kind Gods! ’Tis most ignobly done
To pluck me by the Beard!”
In a more mocking humour, 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.”
Then as characteristics, we have the black, white, straw-colored,
orange-tawney, purple-in-grain, and perfect yellow. The soldier Bearded
like a pard; the justice with Beard of formal cut; the sexton’s hungry
Beard; and the Beard of the general’s cut; and that fine passage, which
you will pardon my quoting, if only to supply an obvious correction
naturally lost sight of by _Beardless_ commentators. If instead of the
puerile conceit, _stairs_ of sand, we read _layers_ of sand, we not only
restore metaphorical beauty but literal truth; for what is more
deceitful than a layer of sand, and the Beard is “a layer of hair.”
“There is no one so simple but assumes
Some mark of virtue on his outward parts;
How many cowards, whose hearts are all as false
As _layers_ of sand, wear yet upon their chins
The Beards of Hercules and frowning Mars,
Who, inward searched, have livers white as milk:
And these assume but valour’s excrement
To make themselves redoubted.”[29]
Footnote 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.
The witty Robert Green, published in 1592, a curious dialogue,[30] from
which we get a glimpse into a Barber’s shop of Queen Elizabeth’s time.
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 innamorato, 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? If it
be his pleasure to have his appendices pruned, or his moustaches
fostered to turn about his ears like the branches of a vine, or cut down
to the lip with the Italian lash, to make him look like a half-faced
bauby in brass. These quaint terms Master Barber, you greet Master
Velvet-breeches withal, and at every word a snap with your scissors and
a cringe with your knee; whereas, when you come to poor Cloth-breeches,
you either cut his Beard at your own pleasure, or else in disdain ask
him if he will be trimmed with Christ’s cut, round like the half of a
Holland cheese, mocking both Christ and us.”[31]
Footnote 30:
“Quip for an Upstart Courtier.”
Footnote 31: