THE
MIRROR OF THE GRACES.
CONTAINING
GENERAL INSTRUCTIONS
FOR COMBINING
ELEGANCE, SIMPLICITY, AND ECONOMY
WITH FASHION IN DRESS;
HINTS ON FEMALE ACCOMPLISHMENTS AND MANNERS;
AND DIRECTIONS FOR THE PRESERVATION OF
HEALTH AND BEAUTY.
BY A LADY OF DISTINCTION.
“If Beauty be woman’s weapon, it must be feathered by the Graces,
pointed by the eye of Discretion, and shot by the hand of Virtue.”
FROM THE LONDON EDITION.
BOSTON:
PUBLISHED BY FREDERIC S. HILL,
NO. 7, WATER STREET.
1831.
CONTENTS.
Preliminary Observations on the Subject 5
General Remarks on the Manners and Fashions of the
Past and Present Times 14
On the Female Form 19
The same Subject, of Female Beauty, more explicitly
considered 34
General Thoughts on Dress and Personal Decoration 48
On the Peculiarities of Dress, with reference to the
Station of the Wearer 68
Of the Detail of Dress 82
On Deportment 105
Peculiarities in Carriage and Demeanor 110
On the Management of the Person in Dancing, and in
the exercise of other Female Accomplishments 126
Continuation of the same Subject 149
Conclusion 156
APPENDIX.
On the Use of Corsets 163
On the Ladies’ Passion for Levelling all Distinction of
Dress 173
Recipes 183
MIRROR
OF
THE GRACES.
PRELIMINARY OBSERVATIONS ON THE SUBJECT.
“Not equal, as their sex not equal seemed;
For contemplation he, and valor formed;
For softness she, and sweet attractive grace;
He for God only, she for God in him.”
MILTON.
In discoursing on the degree of consequence, in the scale of creation,
that may be allowed to the human body, two extremes are generally
adopted. Epicureans, for obvious reasons, exalt our corporeal part to
the first rank; and Stoics, by opposite deductions, degrade it to the
last. But to neither of these opinions can the writer of these pages
concede.
The body is as much a part of the human creature as the mind; by its
outward expression, we convey to others a sense of our opinions,
hopes, fears, and affections--we communicate love, and we excite it.
We enjoy, not only the pleasures of the senses, but the delights which
shoot from mind to mind, in the pressure of a hand, the glance of an
eye, and the whisper of the heart. Shall we then despise this ready and
obedient vehicle of all that passes within the invisible soul? Shall
we contemn it as a lump of encumbering clay--as a piece of corruption,
fitter for the charnel-house than the bosom of affection?
These ascetic ideas may be consistent with the thankless superstition
of the ancient Zenos, or the modern fanatics, who see neither beauty
nor joyfulness in the works of the bounteous Lord of Nature; but the
rational and fair-judging mind, which acknowledges “use and decency”
in all the Creator’s works, while it turns from the pagan devotion
which the libertine pays to his own body, regards that inferior part
of himself with the respect which is due to it in consideration of its
Maker and its purpose.
“Reverence thyself!” says the philosopher, not only with relation to
the mind which directs, but to the body which executes. God created the
body, not only for usefulness, but adorned it with loveliness; and what
he has made so pleasing, shall we disesteem, and refuse to apply to its
admirable destination?--The very approving and innocent complacency
we all feel in the contemplation of beauty, whether it be that of a
landscape or of a flower, is a sufficient witness that the pleasure
which pervades our hearts at the sight of human charms, was planted
there by the Divine Framer of all things, as a principle of delight and
social attraction. To this end, then, I seek to turn your attention,
my fair countrywomen, upon YOURSELVES!--not only to the cultivation of
your minds, but to maintain in its intended station that inferior part
of yourselves, which mistaken gravity would, on the one hand, lead you
to neglect as altogether worthless; and vanity, on the other, incline
you too much to cherish, and egregiously to over-value.
From this you will gather, that the PERSON of a woman is the primary
subject of this discourse.
Mothers, perhaps, (those estimable mothers who value the souls as
the better parts of their daughters,) may start at such a text. But
I call them to recollect, that it is “good all things should be in
order!” This is a period when absurdity, bad taste, shamelessness, and
self-interest, in the shapes of tire-men and tire-women, have arranged
themselves in close siege around the beauty, and even chastity, of your
daughters; and to preserve these graces in their original purity, I, a
woman of virtue and a Christian, do not think it beneath my dignity to
lift my pen.
Dr. Knox will not refuse to be my auxiliary, as a grave auxiliary
may be necessary to give consequence to a subject usually deemed so
trivial. “Taste requires a congruity between the internal character
and the external appearance,” says he; “and the imagination will
involuntarily form to itself an idea of such a correspondence. First
ideas are in general of considerable consequence; and I should,
therefore, think it wise in the female world to take care that
their _appearance_ should not convey a forbidding idea to the most
superficial observer.”
Another author shall speak for me besides this respected moralist.
The very High Priest of the Graces, the discriminating Chesterfield,
declared, that “a prepossessing exterior is a perpetual letter of
recommendation.” To show how different such an exterior is from
affectation and extravagance, is one object of these pages; and I hope
that my fair and candid readers will, after perusal, lay them down with
a conviction that beauty is a blessing, and is to be used with maidenly
discretion; that modesty is grace; simplicity elegance; and consistency
the charm which rivets the attracted heart of well-judging men.
That you have sought my sentiments on these subjects makes it easier
to me to enter into the minute detail I meditate. Indeed, I have
ever blamed, as impolitic, the austerity which condemns, without
distinction, any attention to personal appearance. It is surely
more reasonable to direct the youthful mind to that medium between
negligence and nicety which will preserve the person in health and
elegance, than, by leaving a young woman ignorant of the real and
supposed advantages of these graces, render her liable to learn the
truth in the worst way from strangers, who will either insult her
aggravated deformity, or teach her to set off her before-obscured
charms with, perhaps, meretricious assistance.
It is unjust and dangerous to hold out false lights to young persons;
for, finding that their guides have, in one respect, designedly led
them astray, they may be led likewise to reject as untrue all else
they have been taught; and so nothing but disappointment, error, and
rebellion can be the consequence.
Let girls advancing to womanhood be told the true state of the world
with which they are to mingle. Let them know its real opinions on the
subjects connected with themselves as women, companions, friends,
relatives. Hide not from them what society thinks and expects on all
these matters; but fail not to show them, at the same time, where the
fashions of the day would lead them wrong--where the laws of heaven and
man’s approving (though not always submitting) reason, would keep them
right.
Let religion and morality be the foundation of the female character.
The artist may then adorn the structure without any danger to its
safety. When a girl is instructed on the great purposes of her
existence,--that she is an immortal being, as well as a mortal
woman,--you may, without fearing ill impressions, show her, that as we
admire the beauty of the rose, as well as esteem its medicinal power,
so her personal charms will be dear in the eyes of him whose heart is
occupied by the graces of her yet more estimable mind. We may safely
teach a well-educated girl, that virtue ought to wear an inviting
aspect--that it is due to her excellence to decorate her comely
apparel. But we must never cease to remember that it is VIRTUE we seek
to adorn. It must not be a merely beautiful form; for that, if it
possess not the charm of intelligence, the bond of rational tenderness,
is a frame without a soul--a statue which we look on and admire, pass
away and forget. We must impress upon the yet ingenuous maid, that
while beauty attracts, its influence is transient, unless it presents
itself as the harbinger of that good sense and principle which can
alone secure the affection of a husband, the esteem of friends, and the
respect of the world. Show her that regularity of features and symmetry
of form are not essentials in the composition of the woman whom the
wise man would select as the partner of his life. Seek, as an example,
some one of your less fair acquaintance, whose sweet disposition,
gentle manners, and winning deportment, render her the delight of her
kindred, the dear solace of her husband. Show your young and lovely
pupil what use this amiable woman has made of her few talents; and then
call on her to cultivate her more extraordinary endowments to the glory
of her Creator, the honor of her parents, and to the maintenance of her
own happiness in both worlds. To do this, requires that her aims should
be virtuous, and the means she employs to reach them of the same nature.
We know, from every record under heaven, from the sacred page to
that of the heathen world, that woman was made to be the help-mate
of man--that, by rendering herself pleasing in his sight, she is the
assuager of his pains, the solacer of his wo, the sharer of his joys,
the chief agent in the communication of his sublunary bliss. This
is beautifully alluded to in the Book of Genesis, where the work of
Creation is represented as incomplete, and the felicity of Paradise
itself imperfect, till woman was bestowed to consummate its delights:--
“The world was sad! the garden was a wild;
And man, the hermit, sighed--till woman smiled.”
We have all read in the sacred oracles, that “a woman’s desire is unto
her husband!” and for that tender relation, the first on earth, (for,
before the bonds of relationship, man and woman became a wedded pair,)
woman must leave father and mother, and cleave unto him alone. Hence,
I shall no longer beg the question, whether it be not right that a
chaste maid should adorn herself with the graces of youth and modesty,
and, with a sober reference to the duties of her sex, present herself a
candidate for the love and protection of manliness and virtue, in the
most agreeable manner possible.
By making the fairness of the body the sign of the mind’s purity, man
is imperceptibly attracted to the object designed for him by Heaven as
the partner of his life, the future mother of his children, and the
angel which is to accompany him into eternity. Hence, insignificant
as the means may seem, the end is great; and poor as we may choose to
consider them, we all feel their effects, and enjoy their sweetness.
Having thus explained my subject, my fair friends will readily
perceive, that there cannot be anything hostile to female delicacy in
the prosecution of my scheme. I give to woman all her privileges; I
allow her the empire of all her personal charms; I will assist her to
increase their force: but it must be with a constant reference to their
being the ensign of her more estimable mental attractions. She must
never suppose that when I insist on attention to person and manners,
I forget the mind and heart; or when I commend external grace, that I
pass unregarded the internal beauty of the virgin soul.
In order to give a regular and perspicuous elucidation of the several
branches of my subject, I shall arrange them under separate heads.
Sometimes I may illustrate by observations drawn from abroad, at other
times by remarks collected at home. Having been a traveller in my
youth, whilst visiting foreign courts with my husband, on an errand
connected with the general welfare of nations, I could not overlook the
influence which the women of every country hold over the morals and
happiness of the opposite sex in every rank and degree.
Fine taste in apparel I have ever seen the companion of pure morals,
whilst a licentious style of dress was as certainly the token of
the like laxity in manners and conduct. To correct this dangerous
fashion, ought to be the study and attempt of every mother--of every
daughter--of every woman.
GENERAL REMARKS ON THE MANNERS AND FASHIONS OF THE PAST AND PRESENT
TIMES.
“Manners with fortunes, humors turn with climes,
Tenets with books, and principles with times.”
POPE.
When Innocence left the world, astonished man blushed at his own
and his partner’s nakedness, and coverings were soon invented. For
many an age, the twisted foliage of trees, and the skins of beasts,
were the only garments which clothed our ancestors. Decoration was
unknown, excepting the wild flower, plucked from the luxuriant shrub,
the shell from the beach, or the berry off the tree. Nature was then
unsophisticated; and the lover looked for no other attraction in his
bride, than the peach-bloom on her cheek--the downcast softness of her
consenting eye.
In after times, when Avarice ploughed the earth, and Ambition bestrode
it, the gem and the silken fleece, the various product of the loom,
and the Tyrian mystery of dyes, all united to give embellishments to
beauty, and splendor to majesty of mien. But even at that period, when
the east and south laid their decorating riches at the feet of woman,
we see, by the sculpture yet remaining to us, that the dames of Greece
(the then exemplars of the world) were true to the simple laws of just
taste. The amply-folding robe, cast round the harmonious form; the
modest clasp and zone on the bosom; the braided hair, or the veiled
head; these were the fashions alike of the wife of a Phocion, and the
mistress of an Alcibiades. A chastened taste ruled at their toilets;
and from that hour to this, the forms and modes of Greece have been
those of the poet, the sculptor, and the painter.
Rome, queen of the world! the proud dictatress to Athenian and Spartan
dames, disdained not to array herself in their dignified attire; and
the statues of her virgins, her matrons, and her empresses, show, in
every portico of her ancient streets, the graceful fashions of her
Grecian province.
The irruption of the Goths and Vandals made it needful for women to
assume a more repulsive garb. The flowing robe, the easy shape, the
soft, unfettered hair, gave place to skirts, shortened for flight or
contest--to the hardened vest, and head buckled in gold or silver.
Thence, by a natural descent, have we the iron boddice, stiff
farthingale, and spiral coiffure, of the middle ages. The courts of
Charlemagne, of our Edwards, Henries, and Elizabeth, all exhibit
the figures of women as if in a state of siege. Such lines of
circumvallation and outworks; such impregnable bulwarks of whale-bone,
wood, and steel; such impassable mazes of gold, silver, silk, and
furbelows, met a man’s view, that, before he had time to guess it was
a woman that he saw, she had passed from his sight; and he only formed
a vague wish on the subject, by hearing, from an interested father or
brother, that the moving castle was one of the softer sex.
These preposterous fashions disappeared, in England, a short time after
the Restoration; they had been a little on the wane during the more
classic, though distressful reign of Charles I.; and what the beautiful
pencil of Vandyke shows us, in the graceful dress of Lady Carlisle and
Sacharissa, was rendered yet more correspondent to the soft undulations
of nature, in the garments of the lovely, but frail beauties of the
Second Charles’s court. But as change too often is carried to extremes,
in this case the unzoned tastes of the English ladies thought no
freedom too free; their vestments were gradually unloosened of the
brace, until another touch would have exposed the wearer to no thicker
covering than the ambient air.
The matron reign of Anne, in some measure, corrected this indecency.
But it was not till the accession of the House of Brunswick, that it
was finally exploded, and gave way by degrees to the ancient mode of
female fortification, by introducing the hideous Parisian fashion of
hoops, buckram stays, waists to the hips, screwed to the circumference
of a wasp, brocaded silks stiff with gold, shoes with heels so high as
to set the wearer on her toes; and heads, for quantity of false hair,
either horse or human, and height to outweigh, and perhaps outreach,
the Tower of Babel! These were the figures which our grandmothers
exhibited; nay, such was the appearance I myself made in my early
youth; and something like it may yet be seen at a drawing-room, on
court-days.
When the arts of Sculpture and Painting, in their fine specimens from
the chisels of Greece and the pencils of Italy, were brought into this
country, taste began to mould the dress of our female youth after their
more graceful fashion. The health-destroying boddice was laid aside;
brocades and whale-bone disappeared; and the easy shape and flowing
drapery again resumed the rights of nature and of grace. The bright
hues of auburn, raven, or golden tresses, adorned the head in its
native simplicity, putting to shame the few powdered _toupees_, which
yet lingered on the brow of prejudice and deformity.
Thus, for a short time, did the Graces indeed preside at the toilet of
the British beauty; but a strange caprice seems now to have dislodged
these gentle handmaids. Here stands affectation distorting the form
into a thousand unnatural shapes; and there, ill-taste, loading it
with grotesque ornaments, gathered (and mingled confusedly) from
Grecian and Roman models, from Egypt, China, Turkey, and Hindostan.
All nations are ransacked to equip a modern fine lady; and, after all,
she may perhaps strike a contemporary _beau_ as _a fine lady_, but no
son of nature could, at a glance, possibly find out that she meant to
represent an _elegant woman_.
To impress upon your minds, my fair friends, that symmetry of figure
ought ever to be accompanied by harmony of dress, and that there is a
certain propriety in habiliment adapted to form, age, and degree, shall
be the purport of my next observations.
ON THE FEMALE FORM.
“Who doth not feel, until his aching sight
Faints into dimness with its own delight,
His changing cheek, his sinking heart, confess
The might, the majesty of loveliness?”
BYRON.
To preserve the health of the human form, is the first object of
consideration. This is of primary importance, for with its health we
necessarily maintain its symmetry, and improve its beauty.
The foundation of a just proportion, in all its parts, must be laid
in infancy; for, “as the twig is bent, the tree’s inclined.” A light
dress, which gives freedom to the functions of life and action, is
the best adapted to permit unobstructed growth; for thence the young
fibres, uninterrupted by obstacles of art, will shoot harmoniously
into the form which nature drew. The garb of childhood should in all
respects be easy; not to impede its movements by ligatures on the
chest, the loins, the legs, or the arms. By this liberty, we shall
see the muscles of the limbs gradually assume the fine swell and
insertions which only unconstrained exercise can produce. The shape
will sway gracefully on the firmly poised waist; the chest will rise
in noble and healthy expanse; and the human figure will start forward
at the blooming age of youth, maturing into the full perfection of
unsophisticated nature.
The lovely form of woman, in particular, thus educated, or rather thus
left to its natural bias, assumes a variety of interesting characters.
In one youthful figure, we see the lineaments of a wood-nymph; a form
slight and elastic in all its parts. The shape,
“Small by degrees, and beautifully less,
From the soft bosom to the tender waist!”
A foot light as that of her whose flying step scarcely brushed the
“unbending corn;” and limbs, whose agile grace moved in gay harmony
with the turns of her swan-like neck and sparkling eyes.
Another fair one appears with the chastened dignity of a vestal.
Her proportions are of a less aërial outline. As she draws near, we
perceive that the contour of her figure is on a broader and less
flexible scale than that of her more ethereal sister. Euphrosyne speaks
in the one, Melpomene in the other.
Between these two lies the whole range of female character in form;
and, in proportion as the figure approaches the one extreme or the
other, we call it grave or gay, majestic or graceful. Not but that
the same person may, by a happy combination of charms, unite these
qualities in different degrees, as we sometimes see graceful majesty
and majestic grace. Unless the commanding figure softens the amplitude
of its contour with a gentle elegance, it may possess a sort of regal
consequence, but it will be that of a heavy and harsh importance;
and, on the other hand, unless the slight and airy form, full of
youth and animal spirits, superadds to these attractions the grace of
a restraining dignity, her vivacity will be deemed levity, and her
activity the romping of a wild hoyden.
Young women, therefore, when they present themselves to the world, must
not implicitly fashion their demeanors according to the levelling rules
of the generality of school-governesses; but, considering the character
of their own figures, allow their deportment, and select their dress,
to follow and correct the bias of nature.
There is a class of female contour which bears such faint marks of any
positive character, that the best advice I can give to them who have
it, is to assume that of the sedate. Such an appearance is unobtrusive;
it is amiable, and not only secure from animadversion, but very likely
to awaken respect and love. Indeed, in all cases, a modest reserve is
essential to the perfection of feminine attraction.
As it has been observed, that, during the period of youth, different
women wear a variety of characters, such as the gay, the grave, &c.
when it is found that even this loveliest season of life places its
subjects in varying lights, how necessary does it seem that women
should carry this idea yet further by analogy, and recollect that she
has a summer as well as a spring, an autumn, and a winter! As the
aspect of the earth alters with the changes of the year, so does the
appearance of a woman adapt itself to the time which passes over her.
Like the rose, she buds, she blooms, she fades, she dies!
When the freshness of virgin youth vanishes--when Delia passes her
teens, and approaches her thirtieth year, she may then consider her
day as at the meridian; but the sun which shines so brightly on her
beauties, declines while it displays them. A few short years, and the
jocund step, the airy habit, the sportive manner, must all be exchanged
for “faltering steps and slow.” Before this happens, it would be well
for her to remember that it is wiser to throw a shadow over her yet
unimpaired charms, than to hold them in the light till they are seen to
decay.
Each age has an appropriate style of figure and pleasing; and it is
the business of discernment and taste to discover and maintain those
advantages in their due seasons.
The general characteristics of youth, are meek dignity, chastened
sportiveness, and gentle seriousness. Middle age has the privilege of
preserving, unaltered, the graceful majesty and tender gravity which
may have marked its earlier years. But the gay manners of the comic
muse must, in the advance of life, be discreetly softened down into
little more than cheerful amenity. Time marches on, and another change
takes place. Amiable as the former characteristics may be, they must
give way to the sober, the venerable aspect with which age, experience,
and “a soul commercing with the skies,” ought to adorn the silver hairs
of the Christian matron.
Nature having maintained a harmony between the figure of woman and
her years, it is decorous that the consistency should extend to
the materials and fashion of her apparel. For youth to dress like
age, is an instance of bad taste seldom seen. But age, affecting
the airy garments of youth, the transparent _drapery of Cos_, and
the sportiveness of a girl, is an anachronism as frequent as it is
ridiculous.
Virgin, bridal Beauty, when she arrays herself with taste, obeys an
end of her creation--that of increasing her charms in the eyes of some
virtuous lover, or the husband of her bosom. She is approved. But when
the wrinkled fair, the hoary-headed matron, attempts to equip herself
for conquest, to awaken sentiments which, when the bloom on her cheek
has disappeared, her rouge can never recall; and, despite of all her
efforts, we can perceive “_memento mori_” written on her face, then
we cannot but deride her folly, or, in pity, counsel her rather to
seek for charms, the mental graces of Madame de Sevigné, than the
meretricious arts of Ninon de l’Enclos.
But that, in some cases, wrinkles may be long warded off, and auburn
locks preserve a lengthened freshness, is not to be denied; and, where
nature prolongs the youth of a Helen or a Sarah, it is not for man
to see her otherwise. These are rare instances; and, in the minds of
rational women, ought rather to excite wonder, than desire to emulate
their extended reign. But what ought to be, we know is not always
adopted. St. Evremond has told us, that “a woman’s last sighs are for
her beauty;” and what this wit has advanced, the sex has ever been
too ready to confirm. A strange kind of art, a sort of sorcery, is
prescribed by tradition, and in books, in the form of cosmetics, &c.,
to preserve female charms in perpetual youth. But I fear that, until
these composts can be concocted in Medea’s caldron, they will never
have any better effect than exercising the faith and patience of the
credulous dupes, who expect to find the _elixir vitæ_ in any mixture
under heaven.
The rules which I would lay down for the preservation of the bloom of
beauty, during its natural life, are few, and easy of access. And,
besides having advantage of speaking from my own wide and minute
observation, I have the authorities of the most eminent physicians of
every age, to support my argument.
The secret of preserving beauty lies in three things,--temperance,
exercise, and cleanliness.--From these few heads, I hope much good
instruction may be deduced. _Temperance_ includes moderation at
table, and in the enjoyment of what the world calls pleasure. A young
beauty, were she fair as Hebe, and elegant as the Goddess of Love
herself, would soon lose these charms by a course of inordinate eating,
drinking, and late hours.
I guess that my delicate young readers will start at this last
sentence, and wonder how it can be that any well-bred woman should
think it possible that pretty ladies could be guilty of either of
the two first-mentioned excesses. But, when I speak of _inordinate_
eating, &c., I do not mean feasting like a glutton, or drinking to
intoxication. My objection is not more against the quantity than the
quality of the dishes which constitute the usual repast of women of
fashion. Their breakfasts not only set forth tea and coffee, but
chocolate, and _hot_ bread and butter. Both of these latter articles,
when taken constantly, are hostile to health and female delicacy.
The heated grease, which is their principal ingredient, deranges the
stomach; and, by creating or increasing bilious disorders, gradually
overspreads the fair skin with a wan or yellow hue. After this meal,
a long and exhausting fast not unfrequently succeeds, from ten in the
morning till six or seven in the evening, when dinner is served up;
and the half-famished beauty sits down to sate a keen appetite with
Cayenne soups, fish, French patées steaming with garlic, roast and
boiled meat, game, tarts, sweetmeats, ices, fruits, &c. &c. &c. How
must the constitution suffer under the digestion of this _melange_!
How does the heated complexion bear witness to the combustion within!
And, when we consider that the beverage she takes to dilute this mass
of food, and assuage the consequent fever in her stomach, is not merely
water from the spring, but champagne, madeira, and other wines, foreign
and domestic, you cannot wonder that I should warn the inexperienced
creature against intemperance. The superabundance of aliment which
she takes in at this time, is not only destructive of beauty, but the
period of such repletion is full of other dangers. Long fasting wastes
the powers of digestion, and weakens the springs of life. In this
enfeebled state, at the hour when nature intends we should prepare for
general repose, we put our stomach and animal spirits to extraordinary
exertion. Our vital functions are overtasked and overloaded;--we become
hectic--for observation strongly declares that invalid and delicate
persons should rarely eat solids after three o’clock in the day, as
fever is generally the consequence; and thus, almost every complaint
that distresses and destroys the human frame, may be engendered.
“When hunger calls, obey; nor often wait
Till hunger sharpen to corrosive pain;
For the keen appetite will feast beyond
What nature well can bear; and one extreme
Ne’er without danger meets its own reverse.”
Besides, when we add to this evil the present mode of bracing the
digestive part of the body, in what is called _long stays_, to what
an extent must reach the baneful effects of a protracted and abundant
repast? Indeed, I am fully persuaded that long fasting, late dining,
and the excessive repletion then taken into the exhausted stomach,
with the tight pressure of steel and whalebone on the most susceptible
parts of the frame then called into action, and the midnight, nay,
morning hours, of lingering pleasure, are the positive causes of colds
taken, bilious fevers, consumptions, and atrophies. By the means
enumerated, the firm texture of the constitution is broken, and the
principles of health being in a manner decomposed, the finest parts
fly off, and the dregs maintain the poor survivor of herself, in a sad
kind of artificial existence. Delicate proportion gives place either
to miserable leanness or shapeless fat. The once fair skin assumes a
pallid rigidity, or a bloated redness, which the vain possessor would
still regard as the roses of health and beauty.
To repair these ravages, comes the aid of padding, to give shape where
there is none; long stays, to compress into form the chaos of flesh;
and paints of all hues, to rectify the disorder of the complexion. But
useless are these attempts. If dissipation, disease, and immoderation,
have wrecked the fair vessel of female charms, it is not in the power
of Esculapius himself to refit the shattered bark; or of the Syrens,
with all their songs and wiles, to conjure its battered sides from the
rocks, and make it ride the seas in gallant trim again.
It is with pleasure that I turn from this ruin of all that is
beauteous and lovely, to the cheering hope of preserving every charm
unimpaired; and by means which the most ingenuous mind need not blush
to acknowledge.
The rules, I repeat, are few. First, _Temperance_: a well-timed use of
the table, and so moderate a pursuit of pleasure, that the midnight
ball, assembly, and theatre, shall not too frequently recur.
My next specific is that of gentle and daily _Exercise_ in the open
air. Nature teaches us, in the gambols and sportiveness of the young of
the lower animals, that bodily exertion is necessary for the growth,
vigor, and symmetry of the animal frame; while the too studious
scholar, and the indolent man of luxury, exhibit in themselves the
pernicious consequences of the want of exercise.
This may be almost always obtained, either on horseback or on foot,
in fine weather; and when that is denied, in a carriage. Country
air in the fields, or in gardens, when breathed at proper hours,
is an excellent bracer of the nerves, and a sure brightener of the
complexion. But these hours are neither under the mid-day sun in
summer, when its beams scorch the skin and ferment the blood; nor
beneath the dews of evening, when the imperceptible damps, saturating
the thinly-clad body, send the wanderer home infected with the disease
that is to lay her, ere a returning spring, in the silent tomb! Both
these periods are pregnant with danger to delicacy and carelessness.
The morning, about two or three hours after sunrise, is the most
salubrious time for a vigorous walk. But, as the day advances, if
you choose to prolong the sweet enjoyment of the open air, then the
thick wood or shady lane will afford refreshing shelter from the too
intense heat of the sun. In short, the morning and evening dew, and the
unrepelled blaze of a summer noon, must alike be ever avoided as the
enemies of health and beauty.
“Fly, if you can, these violent extremes
Of air; the wholesome is nor moist nor dry.”
ARMSTRONG.
_Cleanliness_, my last recipe, (and which is, like the others,
applicable to all ages,) is of most powerful efficacy. It maintains the
limbs in their pliancy, the skin in its softness, the complexion in
its lustre, the eyes in their brightness, the teeth in their purity,
and the constitution in its fairest vigor. To promote cleanliness, I
can recommend nothing preferable to bathing.
The frequent use of tepid baths is not more grateful to the sense than
it is salutary to the health, and to beauty. By such ablution, all
accidental corporeal impurities are thrown off; cutaneous obstructions
removed; and while the surface of the body is preserved in its original
brightness, many threatening disorders are removed or prevented. Colds
in the young, and rheumatic and paralytic affections in the old, are
all dispersed by this simple and delightful antidote. By such means the
women of the East render their skins softer than that of the tenderest
babes in this climate, and preserve that health which sedentary
confinement would otherwise destroy.
This delightful and delicate Oriental fashion is now, I am happy to
say, prevalent almost all over the continent. From the Villas of Italy,
to the Chateaux of France; from the Castles of Germany, to the Palaces
of Muscovy; we may everywhere find the marble bath under the vaulted
portico or the sheltering shade. Every house of every nobleman or
gentleman, in every nation under the sun, excepting Britain, possesses
one of those genial friends to cleanliness and comfort. The generality
of English ladies seem to be ignorant of the use of any bath larger
than a wash-hand basin. This is the more extraordinary to me, when I
contemplate the changeable temperature of the climate, and consider
the corresponding alterations in the bodily feelings of the people.
By abruptly checking the secretions, it produces those chronic and
cutaneous diseases so peculiar to our nation, and so heavy a cause of
complaint.
This very circumstance renders baths more necessary in England than
anywhere else; for as this is the climate most subject to sudden heats
and colds, rains and fogs, tepid immersion is the only sovereign remedy
against their usual morbific effects. Indeed, so impressed am I with
the consequence of their regimen, that I strongly recommend to every
lady to make a bath as indispensable an article in her house as a
looking-glass:
“This is the purest exercise of health,
The kind refresher of the summer heats;
Even from the body’s purity, the mind
Receives a secret sympathetic aid.”
It may be remarked, _en passant_, that rubbing of the skin in the bath
is an excellent substitute for _exercise_, when that is impracticable
out-of-doors.
I must not draw this chapter to a close without offering my fair
readers a few remarks on the malignant influence exercised on the
features by an ill-regulated temper. The face is the index of the mind.
On its expressive page are recorded in characters lasting as life
itself, the gloom of sullenness, the arrogance of pride, the withering
of envy, or the storm of anger; for, even after the fury of the tempest
has subsided, its fearful devastations remain behind.
“From anger she may then be freed,
But peevishness and spleen succeed.”
The first emotions of anger are apparent to the most superficial
observer. Every indulgence in its paroxysms, both adds strength to its
authority, and engraves its history in deeper relief on the forehead
of its votaries. What a pity it is that antiquity provides us with
no authentic portrait of the illustrious Xantippe! for I am sure the
features of that lady would lend their ready testimony to the value of
my admonitions.
When good-humor and vivacity reign within, the face is lighted up with
benignant smiles; where peace and gentleness are the tenants of the
bosom, the countenance beams with mildness and complacency. Evil temper
has, with truth, been called a more terrible enemy to beauty than the
small-pox. I beseech you, therefore, as you value the preservation of
your charms, to resist the dominion of this rude despoiler, to foster
and encourage the feelings of kindliness and good-humor, and to repress
every emotion of a contrary character.
I shall conclude this important subject by remarking with the
Spectator, that “no woman can be handsome by the force of features
alone, any more than she can be witty only by the gift of speech.”
THE SAME SUBJECT, OF FEMALE BEAUTY, MORE EXPLICITLY CONSIDERED.
“Let Art no useless ornament display,
But just explain what Nature meant to say.”
YOUNG.
So far, my friends, I have thrown together my sentiments on the
aggregate of the female form: I shall now descend to particulars, and
leave it to your judgments to adopt my suggestions according to the
correspondence with your different characters.
The preservation of an agreeable complexion (which always presupposes
health) is not the most insignificant of exterior charms. Though we
yield due admiration to regularity of features, (the Grecian contour
being usually so called,) yet when we consider them merely in the
outline, our pleasure can go no further than that of a cold critic,
who regards the finely proportioned lineaments of life as he would
those of a statue. It is complexion that lends animation to a picture;
it is complexion that gives spirit to the human countenance. Even the
language of the eyes loses half its eloquence, if they speak from the
obscurity of an inexpressive skin. The life-blood in the mantling
cheek; the ever-varying hues of nature glowing in the face, “as if her
very body thought;” these are alike the ensigns of beauty and the
heralds of the mind; and the effect is, an impression of loveliness, an
attraction, which fills the beholder with answering animation and the
liveliest delight.
“’Tis not a lip or eye we beauty call,
But the joint force and full result of all.”
As a Juno-featured maid with a dull skin, by most people, will only be
coldly pronounced _critically_ handsome; so a young woman with very
indifferent features, but a fine complexion, will, from ten persons out
of twelve, receive spontaneous and warm admiration.
The experience (when once we admit the proposition that it is _right_
to keep the casket bright which contains so precious a gem as the soul)
must induce us to take precautions against the injuries continually
threatening the tender surface of the skin. It may be next to an
impossibility, to change the color of an eye, to alter the form of
the nose, or the turn of the mouth; but though Heaven has given us a
complexion which vies with the flowers of the field, we yet have it in
our power to render it dingy by neglect, coarse through intemperance,
and sallow by dissipation.
Such excesses must therefore be avoided; for, though there may be a
something in the pallid cheek which excites interest, yet, without a
certain appearance of health, there can never be an impression of
loveliness. A fine, clear skin, gives an assurance of the inherent
residence of three admirable graces to beauty; Wholesomeness, Neatness,
and Cheerfulness. Every fair means ought to be sought to maintain these
vouchers, for not only health of body, but health of mind.
I have already given some hints to this purpose; at least as far as
relates to the purity of the alimentary springs of sublunary life:
those which are in the heart, and point through time into eternity,
must not be less observed; for, unless its thoughts are kept in
corresponding order and the passions held in peace, all prescriptions
will be vain to keep those boiling fluids in check, which, in spite of
Roman fard and balm of Mecca, will spread themselves over the skin,
and there show an outward and visible sign of the malignant spirit
within. Independent of these intellectual causes of corporeal defects,
disorders of the skin, arising from accidental circumstances, are more
frequent in this country than in any other; and the fashions of the
day are still more inimical to the complexion of its inhabitants, than
the climate. The frequent and sudden changes from heat to cold, by
abruptly exciting or repressing the regular secretions of the skin,
roughen its texture, injure its hue, and often deform it with unseemly,
though transitory, eruptions. All this is increased by the habit ladies
have of exposing themselves unveiled, and frequently without bonnets,
in the open air. The head and face have then no defence against the
attacks of the surrounding atmosphere, and the effects are obvious.
The barouche, for this reason, and the more consequential one of
subjecting its inmates to dangerous chills, is a fatal addition to the
variety of English equipages. Our autumnal evenings, with this carriage
and our gossamer apparel, have already sent many of my young female
acquaintance to untimely graves.
To remedy these evils, I would strenuously recommend, for health’s
sake, as well as for beauty, that no lady should make one in any
riding, airing, or walking party, without putting on her head something
capable of affording both shelter and warmth. Shakspeare, the poet
of the finest taste in female charms, makes Viola regret having been
obliged to “throw her sun-expelling mask away!” Such a defence I do not
pretend to recommend; but I consider a veil a useful as well as elegant
part of dress; it can be worn to suit any situation; open or close,
just as the heat or cold may render it necessary.
The custom which some ladies have, when warm, of powdering their faces,
washing them with cold water, or throwing off their bonnets, that they
may cool the faster, are all very destructive habits. Each of them is
sufficient (when it meets with any predisposition in the blood) to
spread a surfeit over the skin, and make a once beautiful face hideous
forever.
The person, when overheated, should always be allowed to cool
gradually, and of itself, without any more violent assistant than,
perhaps, the gentle undulation of the neighboring air by a fan.
Streams of wind from opened doors and windows, or what is called
_a thorough air_, are all bad and highly dangerous applications.
These impatient remedies for heat are often resorted to in balls and
crowded assemblies; and as frequently as they are used, we hear of
sore throats, coughs, and fevers. While it is the fashion to fill a
drawing-room like a theatre, similar means ought to be adopted, to
prevent the ill effects of the consequent corrupted atmosphere, and the
temptation to seek relief by dangerous resources. Instead of the open
balcony, and yawning door, we should see ventilators in every window;
and thus feel a constant succession of pure and temperate air.
Excessive heat, as well as excessive cold, is apt to cause distempers
of the skin; and as the fine lady, by her strange habits, is as prone
to such changes as the desert-wandering gipsy, it is requisite that she
should be particularly careful to correct the deforming consequences of
her fashionable exposures. For her usual ablution, night and morning,
nothing is so fine an emollient for any rigidity or disease of the
face as a wash of French or white brandy, and rose-water; the spirit
making only one-third of the mixture. The brandy keeps up that gentle
action of the skin which is necessary to the healthy appearance of
its parts. It also cleanses the surface. The rose-water corrects the
drying property of the spirit, leaving the skin in a natural, soft, and
flexible state. Where white or French brandy cannot be obtained, half
the quantity of spirits of wine will tolerably supply its place.
The eloquent effect of complexion will, I hope, my fair friends, obtain
your pardon for my having confined your attention so long to what is
generally thought (though in contradiction to what is felt) a trifling
feature, if so I may be allowed to name it.
I am aware of your expectations, that I would give the precedence,
in this dissertation, to the eye. I subscribe to its supereminent
dignity; for none can deny that it is regarded by all nations as the
faithful interpreter of the mind, as the window of the soul, the index
in which we read each varied emotion of the heart; it is, indeed, the
“spirit’s throne of light.” But how increased an expression does this
intelligent feature convey, when aided by the glowing tints of an
eloquent complexion! Indeed, it is the happy coincidence of the eye and
the complexion which forms the strongest point of what the French call
_contenance_.
The animated changes of sensibility are nowhere more apparent than in
the transparent surface of a clear skin. Who has not perceived, and
admired, the rising blush of modesty enrich the cheek of a lovely girl,
and, in the sweet effusion, most gratefully discern the true witness
of the purity within? Who has not been sensible to the sudden glow on
the face, which announces, ere the lips open, or the eye sparkles, the
approach of some beloved object? Nay, will not even the sound of his
name paint the blooming cheek with deeper roses?
“Who hath not owned, with rapture-smitten frame,
The power of grace, the magic of a name?”
Shall we reverse the picture? I have shown how the soul proclaims her
joy through its wondrous medium; shall she speak her sorrows too? Then
let us call to mind, who have beheld the deadly paleness of her who
learns the unexpected destruction of her dearest possessions! Perhaps
a husband, a lover, or a brother, mingled with the slain, or fallen,
untimely, by some dreadful accident. Sudden partings like these
“Press the life from out young hearts.”
We see the darkened, stagnant shade which denotes the despair-stricken
soul. We behold the livid hues of approaching frenzy, or the blacker
stain of settled melancholy! Heloisa’s face is paler than the marble
she kneels upon. In all cases the mind shines through the body; and
according as the medium is dense or transparent, so the light within
seems dull or clear.
Advocate as I am for a fine complexion, you must perceive, that it is
for the _real_, and not the _spurious_. The foundation of my argument,
_the skin’s power of expression_, would be entirely lost, were I to
tolerate that fictitious, that dead beauty, which is composed of white
paints and enamelling. In the first place, as all applications of
this kind are as a mask on the skin, they can never, but at a distant
glance, impose for a moment on a discerning eye. But why should I say
a _discerning eye_? No eye that is of the commonest apprehension can
look on a face bedaubed with white paint, pearl powder, or enamel, and
be deceived for a minute into a belief that so inanimate a “whited
wall” is the human skin. No flush of pleasure, no shudder of pain,
no thrilling of hope, can be descried beneath the encrusted mould;
all that passes within is concealed behind the mummy surface. Perhaps
the painted creature may be admired by an artist as a well-executed
picture; but no man will seriously consider her as a handsome woman.
White painting is, therefore, an ineffectual, as well as dangerous
practice. The proposed end is not obtained; and, as poison lurks under
every layer, the constitution wanes in alarming proportion as the
supposed charms increase.