Sir Claude M. Wade, the reader may remember, was proceeding thus—“On opening it,” (the box containing the Fakeer) “we saw a figure, enclosed in a bag of white linen, drawn together, and fastened by a string over the head; on the exposure of which a grand salute was fired, and the surrounding multitude came crowding to the door to see the spectacle. After they had gratified their curiosity, the Fakeer’s servant, putting his arms into the box, took the figure of his master out; and, closing the door, placed it, with his back against the door, exactly as he had been squatted, like a Hindoo idol, in the box itself. Runjeet Singh and I then descended into the cell, which was so small, that we were only able to sit on the ground in front, and so close to the body, as to touch it with our hands and knees. The servant then began pouring warm water over the figure, but, as my object was to watch if any fraudulent practice could be detected, I proposed to Runjeet Singh, to tear open the bag, and have a perfect view of the body, before any means of resuscitation were attempted. I accordingly did so; and may here remark, that the bag, when first seen by us, looked mildewed, as if it had been buried for some time. The legs and arms of the body were shrivelled and stiff, the face full, as in life, and the head reclining on the shoulder, like that of a corpse.”
“I then called to the medical gentleman, who was attending me, to come down and inspect the body, which he did, but could discover no pulsation, in the heart, temples or the arms. There was however, a heat, about the region of the brain, which no other part of the body exhibited. The servant then commenced bathing him with hot water, and gradually relaxing his arms and legs from the rigid state, in which they were contracted; Runjeet Singh taking his right and left leg, to aid by friction in restoring them to their proper action, during which time the servant placed a hot wheaten cake, about an inch thick, on the top of the head—a process, which he twice or thrice repeated. He then took out of his nostrils and ears the wax and cotton plugs, with which they were stopped, and after great exertion, opened his mouth, by inserting the point of a knife between the teeth, and while holding his jawsopen, with his left hand, drew the tongue forward, with the forefinger of the right, in the course of which the tongue flew back, several times, to its curved position upwards, that in which it had originally been placed, so as to close the gullet. He then rubbed his eyelids with ghee (clarified butter) for some time, till he succeeded in opening them, when the eye appeared quite motionless and glazed. After the cake had been applied for the third time, to the top of the head, the body was convulsively heaved, the nostrils became violently inflated, respiration ensued, and the limbs began to assume a natural fulness. The servant then put some ghee on his tongue, and made him swallow it. A few minutes afterwards, the eyeballs became slowly dilated, recovered their natural color, and the Fakeer, recognizing Runjeet Singh, sitting close by him, articulated, in a low sepulchral tone, scarcely audible—‘Do you believe me now?’”
“Runjeet Singh replied in the affirmative; and then began investing the Fakeer with a pearl necklace, a superb pair of gold bracelets, shawls, and pieces of silk and muslin, forming what is called akhilet, such as is usually conferred, by the princes of India, on persons of distinction. From the time of the box being opened to the recovery of the voice, not more than half an hour could have elapsed; and, in another half an hour, the Fakeer talked with himself and those about him freely, though feebly, like a sick person, and we then left him, convinced that there had been no fraud or collusion, in the exhibition, which we had witnessed.”
The Hon. Captain Osborne, who was attached to the mission of Sir William Macnaughten, in the following year, 1838, sought to persuade the Fakeer to repeat the experiment, and to suffer the keys of the vault to remain in Captain Osborne’s custody. At this the Fakeer became alarmed, though he afterwards consented, and, at the request of Runjeet Singh, he came to Lahore for the purpose; but, as he expressed a strong apprehension, that Captain Osborne intended to destroy him, and as Sir William Macnaughten and his suite were about to depart, the matter was given up. This is related by Captain Osborne, in his “Court and Camp of Runjeet Singh.”
After avowing his entire belief in all the facts, set forth in the previous narrative, Sir Claude M. Wade remarks—“I took some pains to inquire into the mode, by which such a resultwas effected; and was informed, that it rested on a doctrine of the Hindoo physiologists, that heat constitutes the self existent principle of life; and, that, if the functions are so far destroyed, as to leave that one, in perfect purity, life could be sustained for considerable lengths of time, independently of air, food, or any other means of sustenance. To produce such a state, the patients are obliged to go through a severe preparation. How far such means are calculated to produce such effects physiologists will be better able to judge than I can pretend to do. I only state what I saw, and heard, and think.”
This narrative certainly belongs to the very first part of the very first book of very wonderful things. But this marvellous book is no longer a closed volume. Millions of ingenious fingers have, for fifty years, been busily employed, in breaking its mysterious seals, one after another. Demonstration has trampled upon doubt, and the world is rapidly coming to my shrewd old grandmother’s conclusion, that nothing is so truly wonderful, as that we wonder at all. There is nothing more difficult, than to exonerate the mind from the weight of its present consciousness, and to wonder by rule. We readily lose the recollection of our doubt and derision, upon former occasions, when matters, apparently quite as absurd and impossible, are presented for contemplation,de novo.
If putrefaction can be kept off, mere animal life, the vital principle, may be preserved, for a prodigious length of time, in the lower ranks of animal creation, while in a state of torpidity. Dr. Gillies relates, that he bottled up somecerastes, a species of small snakes, and kept them corked tight, with nothing in the bottle, but a little sand, for several years; and, when the bottle was uncorked, they came forth, revived by the air, and immediately acquired their original activity.
More than fifty years ago, having read Dr. Franklin’s account of the flies, which he discovered, drowned, in a bottle of old wine, and which he restored to life, by exposure to the sun’s rays; I bottled up a dozen flies, in a small phial of Madeira—took them out, at the expiration of a month—and placed them under a glass tumbler, in a sunny window. Within half an hour, nine revived; got up; walked about, wiped their faces with their fore legs; trimmed their wings, with their hinder ones; and began to knock their heads, against the tumbler, to escape. After waiting a couple of hours, to give the remainingthree a fair chance, but to no purpose, and expecting nothing from the humane society, for what I had already accomplished, I returned the nine to their wine bath, in the phial. After rather more than three months, I repeated the experiment of resuscitation. After several hours, two gave evidence of revival, got upon their legs, reeled against each other, and showed some symptoms ofmania a potu. At length they were fairly on their trotters. I lifted the tumbler; they took the hint, and flew to the window glass. It was fly time. I watched one of those, who had profited by the revival—he got four or five flies about him, who really seemed to be listening to the account of his experience.
“Ants, bees, and wasps,” says Sharon Turner, in his Sacred History, vol. i. ch. 17, “especially the smallest of these, the ants, do things, and exercise sensibilities, and combine for purposes, and achieve ends, that bring them nearer to mankind, than any other class of animated nature.” Aye, I know, myself, some of our fellow-citizens, who make quite a stir, in their little circles, petty politicians, who extort responses from great men, and show them,in confidence, to all they meet—overgrown boys, in bands and cassocks, who, for mere exercise, edit religious newspapers, and scribbletreason, under the name ofethics—who, in respect to all the qualities, enumerated by Sharon Turner, are decidedly inferior to pismires.
The hybernation of various animals furnishes analogous examples of the matter, under consideration. A suspension of faculties and functions, for a considerable time, followed by a periodical restoration of their use, forms a part of the natural history of certain animals.
Those forty days—that wonderful quarantine of the Fakeer, in the tomb, and his subsequent restoration, are marvels. I have presented the facts, upon the evidence of Sir Claude M. Wade. Every reader will philosophize, upon this interesting matter, for himself. If such experiments can be made, for forty days, it is not easy to comprehend the necessity of such a limit. If trustees were appointed, and gave bonds to keep the tomb comfortable, and free from rats, and to knock up a corpse, at the time appointed, forty years, or an hundred, might answer quite as well. What visions are thus opened to the mind. An author might go to sleep, and wake up in the midst of posterity, and find himself an entire stranger. Weary partners mightfind a temporary respite, in the grave, and leave directions, to be called, in season to attend the funeral. The heir expectant of some tenacious ancestor might thus dispose of the drowsy and unprofitable interval. The gentleman ofpetite fortunemight suffer it to accumulate, in the hands of trustees, and wake up, after twenty or thirty years, a man of affluence. Instead of making up a party for the pyramids, half a dozen merry fellows might be buried together, with the pleasant prospect of rising again in 1949. No use whatever being made of the time thus relinquished, and the powers of life being husbanded in the interim, years would pass uncounted, of course; and he, who was buried, at twenty-one, would be just of age when he awoke. I should like, extremely, to have the opinion of the Fakeer, upon these interesting points.
Old customs, dead and buried, long ago, do certainly come round again, like old comets; but, whether in their appointed seasons, or not, I cannot tell. Whether old usages, and old chairs, and old teapots revolve in their orbits, or not, I leave to the astronomers. It would be very pleasant to be able to calculate the return of hoops, cocked hats, and cork rumpers, buffets, pillions, links, pillories, and sedans.
I noticed the following paragraph, in the Evening Transcript, not long ago, and it led me to turn over some heaps of old relics, in my possession—
“A substitute for the everlasting ‘going, going, gone,’ was introduced at a recent auction in New York. The auctioneer held up a sand-glass, through which the sand occupied fourteen seconds in passing. If a person made a bid, the glass was held up in view of all, and if no person advanced on the bid before the sand passed through, the sale was made. This idea is a novel one, though we believe it has long been practised in Europe.”
It was formerly the custom in England, to sell goods, atauction, “by inch of candle.” An inch of candle was lighted, and the company proceeded to bid, the last crier or bidder, before the candle went out, was declared the purchaser. Samuel Pepys, who was Secretary of the Admiralty, in the reigns of the two last Stuarts, repeatedly refers to the practice, in his Diary. Thus, in Braybrook’s edition, of 1848, he says, vol. i. page 151, under date Nov. 6, 1660—“To our office, where we met all, for the sale of two ships, by an inch of candle, (the first time that I saw any of this kind,) where I observed how they do invite one another, and at last how they all do cry; and we have much to do to tell who did cry last.”
Again, Ibid., vol. ii. page 29, Sept. 3, 1662—“After dinner, we met and sold the Weymouth, Successe, and Fellowship hulkes, where pleasant to see how backward men are at first to bid; and yet, when the candle is going out, how they bawl, and dispute afterwards who bid the most first. And here I observed one man cunninger than the rest, that was sure to bid the last man, and carry it; and, inquiring the reason, he told me, that, just as the flame goes out, the smoke descends, which is a thing I never observed before, and, by that he do know the instant when to bid last.” Again, Ibid., vol. iv. page 4, Ap. 3, 1667, he refers to certain prize goods, “bought lately at the candle.”
Haydn says this species of auction, by inch of candle is derived from a practice, in the Roman Catholic Church. Where there is an excommunication, by inch of candle, and the sinner is allowed to come to repentance, while yet the candle burns. The sinner is supposed, of course, to begoing—going—gone—unless he avails of the opportunity to bid, as it were, for his salvation. This naturally reminds the reader of the spiritual distich—
“For while the lamp holds out to burn,The vilest sinner may return.”
Where the bids are, from a maximum, downward, the term—auction—is still commonly, though improperly employed, and in the very teeth of all etymology. When I was a boy, the poor, in many of our country towns, were disposed of, in this manner. The question was, who would take Daddy Osgood, one of the town’s poor, for the smallest weekly sum, to be paid by the town. The old man was started, at four shillings, and bid down to a minimum. There was yet a little work in his old bones; and I well remember one of these auctions, in 1798, in the townof Billerica, at which Dr. William Bowers bid off Daddy Osgood, for two and sixpence.
The Dutch have a method of selling fresh fish, which is somewhat analogous to this, and very simple and ingenious. An account of it may be found, in Dodsley’s Annual Register, for 1760, vol. iii. page 170. The salesman is called the Affslager. The fish are brought in, in the morning, and placed on the ground, near the fish stalls of the retailers. At ten, precisely, the Affslager rings his bell, which may be heard, for half a mile. Retailers, and individual consumers collect, and the Affslager—the auctioneer—puts up a lot, at a maximum price. No one offers a less sum, but the mynheers stand round, sucking at their pipes, and puffing away, and saying nothing. When the Affslager becomes satisfied, that nobody will buy the lot, at the price named, he gradually lowers it, until one of the mynheers takes his pipe from his mouth and cries “mine!” in High Dutch. He is, of course, the purchaser; and the Affslager proceeds to the sale of another lot.
It will be seen, from one of the citations from Pepys, that some ofthe auctionsof his time were calledthe candles; precisely as the auctions, at Rome, were calledhastæ; a spear orhasta, instead of a flag, being the customary signal for the sale. The proper word, however, wasauctio, and the auctioneer was calledauctor. Notice of the sale was given, by the crier,a præcone prædicari, Plaut. Men., v. 9, 94, or, by writing on tables. Such is the import oftabulum proscripsit, in Cicero’s letter to his brother Quintus, ii. 6.
In the year 1824, passing through the streets of Natchez, I saw a slave, walking along, and ringing a bell, as he went; the bell very much resembled our cowbells, in size and form. Upon a signal from a citizen, the slave stopped ringing, and walked over to him, and stood before him, till he had read the advertisement of a sale at auction, placarded on the breast of the slave, who then went forward, ringing his bell, as before. The Romans made their bids, by lifting the finger; and the auctioneer added as manysesterces, as he thought amounted to a reasonable bid.
Cicero uses this expression in his fine oration against Verres, i 54—digitum tollit Junius patruus—Junius, his paternal uncle, raised his finger, that is, he made a bid.
The employment of a spear, as the signal of an auction sale,is supposed to have arisen from the fact, that the only articles, originally sold, in this manner, were the spoils of war. Subsequently, the spear—hasta—came to be universally used, to signify asale at auction. The auction of Pompey’s goods, by Cæsar, is repeatedly alluded to, by Cicero, with great severity, as thehasta Cæsaris. A passage may be found, in his treatise,De Officiis, ii. 8, and another, in his eighth Philippic, sec. 3—“Invitus dico, sed dicendum est. Hasta Cæsaris, Patres Conscripti, multis improbis spem affert, et audaciam. Viderunt enim, ex mendicis fieri repente divites: itaque hastam semper videre cupiunt ii, qui nostris bonis imminent; quibus omnia pollicetur Antonius.” I say it reluctantly, but it must be said—Cæsar’s auction, Conscript Fathers, inflames the hopes and the insolence of many bad men. For they see how immediately, the merest beggars are converted into men of wealth. Therefore it is that those, who are hankering after our goods and chattels, and to whom Antony has promised all things, are ever longing to behold such another auction, as that.
The auctioneer’s bell, in use, at the Hague, in 1760, was introduced into Boston, seventy-seven years ago, by Mr. Bicker, whose auction-room was near the Market. Having given some offence to the public, he inserted the following notice, in the Boston Gazette and Country Journal, Monday, April 18, 1774—“As the method, lately practised by the Subscriber, in having a Person at his Door, to invite Gentlemen and others to his public Sales—has given Dissatisfaction to some (Gentlemen Shopkeepers in particular) to avoid giving Offence for the future, he shall desist from that Practice, and pursue one (as follows) which he flatters himself cannot fail giving universal Satisfaction, as he sincerely wishes so to do. The Public are most earnestly requested to remember (for their own advantage) that, for the future, Notice will be given, by sounding a Bell, which he has purchased for that Purpose, which is erected over the Auction Room Door, near the Market, Boston, where constant Attendance is given both early and late, to receive the favors of all such who are pleased to confer on theirMuch obliged, Most Obedient, and very humble Servant, M. Bicker.”
Albeit there is no less bickering or dickering here now, than of yore, yet Bicker and his bell have gone, long ago, to the “receptacle of things lost upon earth.” The very name is no more.
Haydn says, the first auction in Britain was about 1700, byElisha Yale, a Governor of Fort George, in the East Indies, of the goods he had brought home with him. That Mr. Haydn must be mistaken is manifest, from the citation from Pepys, who speaks of auctions, by inch of candle, as early as 1660; and not then as a novelty, but the first of the kind that he had witnessed.
Fosbroke says, in his Antiquities, page 412—“In the middle age, the goods were cried and sold to the highest bidder, and the sound of a trumpet added with a very loud noise. The use of the spear was retained, the auctions being calledSubhastationes; and theSubhastator, or auctioneer, was sworn to sell the goods faithfully. In Nares, we have,sold at a pike or spear, i. e. by public auction or outcry; and auctions calledport sales, because originally, perhaps, sales made in ports—the crier stood under the spear, as in the Roman æra, and was, in the thirteenth century, calledcursor.”
Of late,mock auctions, as they are termed, have become a very serious evil, especially in the city of New York. In 1813 petitions, in regard to these public impositions, were sent to the Lords of the Treasury, from many of the principal cities of Great Britain. In 1818 a select committee reported, very fully, upon this subject, to the British Parliament. This committee, after long and critical investigation, reported, that great frauds were constantly committed on the public, bymockor fraudulentauctions. The committee set forth several examples of this species of knavery. Goods are sold, as the furniture of gentlemen, going abroad. For this purpose, empty houses are hired for a few days, and filled with comparatively worthless furniture. Articles of the most inferior manufacture are made for the express purpose of being put into such sales, as the property of individuals of known character and respectability. To impose, more effectually, on the public, the names of the most respectable auctioneers have been used, with the variation of a letter. This bears some analogy to the legislative change of name, in this city, for the purpose of facilitating the sale of inferior pianos. Respectable auctioneers have been compelled, in self-defence, to appear at such mock auctions, and disclaim all connection therewith. Great masses of cutlery and plated ware of base manufacture, with London makers’ names, and advertised, as made in London, are constantly sold, at these auctions; forcing the London makers to appear at the sales rooms, and expose the fraud.
The committee say that no imposition is more common than the sale of ordinary wine, in bottles, as thebonne boucheof some respectable Amphitryon deceased.
They farther state, that daring men are known to combine, attend real sales, and by various means, drive respectable purchasers away, purchase at their own price, and afterwards privately sell, under a form of public sale, among themselves, atKnock Outauctions, as they are called.
The committee recommended an entire revision of the auction laws—an increase of the license—heavier penalties for violation—no sale, without previous exposure of the goods for twenty-four hours, or printed catalogue—name and address of the auctioneer to be published—severe penalty, for using a fictitious name, &c.
The whole advertising system of mock auctions, like that, connected with the kindred impostures of quackery and patent medicines, furnishes a vast amount of curious and entertaining reading; and affords abundant scope, for the exercise of a vicious ingenuity. I have heard of a horse, that could not be compelled, by whip or spur, to cross a bridge, which lay in the way to his owner’s country residence—the horse was advertised to be sold at auction for no fault but that his owner wasdesirous of going out of the city.
Few things are more difficult, than shaving a cold corpse, and making, what theartistescalla good job of it. I heard Robert New say so, forty years ago, who kept his shop, at the north—easterly corner of Scollay’s buildings. He said the barber ought to be called, as soon, as the breath was out of the body, and a little before, if it was a clear case, and you wished the corpse “to look wholesome.” I think he was right. Pope’s Narcissa said—
“One need not sure be ugly, though one’s dead.”
There is considerable mystery, in shaving a living corpse. I find it so; and yet I have always shaved myself; for I have never been able to overcome a strong, hereditary prejudice, against being taken by the nose.
My razor is very capricious; so, I suppose, is everybody’s razor. There is a deep and mystical philosophy, about the edge of a razor, which seems to have baffled the most scientific; and is next of kin to witchcraft. A tract, by Cotton Mather, upon this subject, would be invaluable. The scholar will smile, at any comparison, between Pliny the elder and Cotton Mather. So far, as respects the scope of knowledge, and power of intellect, and inexhaustible treasures, displayed in Pliny’s thirty-seven books of Natural History, one might as well compare Hyperion to a mummy. I allude to nothing but theMagnaliaorImprobabilia; and, upon this point of comparison, Mather, witchcraft and all fairly fade out of sight, before the marvels and fantastical stories of Pliny. In lib. xxviii. 23, Pliny assigns a very strange cause, whyaciem in cultris tonsorum hebetescere—why the edge of a barber’s razor is sometimes blunted. The reader may look it up, if he will—it is better in a work,sub sigillo latinitatis, than in an English journal.
I have often put my razor down, regretting, that my beard did not spread over a larger area; so keenly and agreeably has the instrument performed its work. It really seemed, that I might have shaved a sleeping mouse, without disturbing his repose. After twelve hours, that very razor, untouched the while, has come forth, no better than a pot-sherd. The very reverse of all this has also befallen me. I once heard Revaillon, our old French barber, say, that a razor could not be strapped with too light a hand; and the English proverb was always in his mouth—“a good lather is half the shave.”
Some persons suppose the razor to be an instrument, of comparatively modern invention, and barbers to have sprung up, at farthest, within the Christian era. It is written, in Isaiah vii. 20, “In the same day shall the Lord shave with a razor, that is hired,” &c. Ezekiel began to prophecy, according to Calmet, 590 years before Christ: in the first verse of ch. v. he says—“take thee a sharp knife, take thee a barber’s razor, and cause it to pass upon thy head and upon thy beard.” To cause a razorto pass upon the beardseems to mean something very different fromshaving, in the common sense of that word. Doubtless, it does: theculterornovacula, that is,the razor, of the ancients, was employed, forshearingorshortening, as well as forshavingthe beard. Barbers were first known, among the Romans A. U. C. 454, i. e. 298 years before Christ. Pliny says,vii. 59—Sequens gentium consensus in tonsoribus fuit, sed Romanis tardior. In Italiam ex Sicilia venere post Romam conditam anno quadringentessimo quinquagessimo quarto, adducente P. Ticinio Mena, ut auctor est Varro: antea intonsi fuere. Primus omnium radi quotidie instituit Africanus sequens: Divus Augustus cultris semper usus est. Then barbers came into use, among the nations, but more slowly among the Romans. In the year of the city 454, according to Varro, P. Ticinius Mena introduced barbers into Italy from Sicily: until that time, men wore their beards. The latter Africanus first set the example of being shaven daily. Augustus constantly used razors. The passage of Varro, referred to by Pliny, showing, that, before A. U. C. 454, men wore their beards, states the fact to be established, by the long beards, on all the old male statues. Thatpassing of the sharp knife or razor, upon the beard, spoken of, by Ezekiel, I take to be the latter of the two modes, employed by the Romans—“vel strictim, hoc est, ad cutem usque; vel paulo longius a cute, interposito pectine”—either close to the skin, or with a comb interposed. That both modes were in use is clear from the lines of Plautus in his play of the Captives, Act ii. sc. 2, v. 16—
Nunc senex est in tonstrina; nunc jam cultros adtinet;Sed utrum strictimne adtonsurum dicam esse, an per pectinem,Nescio.
Now the old man is in the barber’s shop and under the razor; but whether to be close shaved, or clipped with the comb, I know not.
Pliny, as we have seen, states, that the practice came from Sicily. There it had been long in use. There is a curious reference to the custom in Cicero’s Tusculan Questions, v. 20. Speaking of the tyrant, Dionysius he says—Quin etiam ne tonsori collum committeret, tondere suas filias docuit. Ita sordido ancillarique artificio regiæ virgines, ut tonstriculæ tondebant barbam et capillum patris. For, not liking to trust his throat to a barber, he taught his daughters to shave him, and thus these royal virgins, descending to this coarse, servile vocation, became little, she barbers, and clipped their father’s beard and hair.
There is a curious passage in Pliny which not only proves, that barbers’ shops were common in his time, but shows the very ancient employment of cobweb, as a styptic. In lib. xxix. 36, he says—Fracto capiti aranei tela ex oleo et aceto imposita, nonnisi vulnere sanato, abscedit. Hæc et vulneribus tonstrinarum sanguinem sistit. Spiders’ web, with oil and vinegar, applied to a broken head, adheres, till the wound heals. This also stops the bleeding from cuts, in barbers’ shops.
Razors were sharpened, some two thousand years ago, very much as they are at present. Pliny devotes sec. 47, lib. xxxvi. to hones and whetstones, oil stones and water stones—quarta ratio—he says—est saliva hominis proficientium in torstrinarum officinis—the fourth kind is such as are used in the barbers’ shops, and which the man softens with his saliva.
Most common, proverbial sayings are, doubtless, of great antiquity. Chopping-blocks with a razor is a common illustration of the employment of a subtle ingenuity, upon coarse and uninteresting topics. Thus Goldsmith, in his Retaliation, says of Burke—
In short, ’twas his fate, unemploy’d, or in place, sir,To eat mutton cold, and chop blocks with a razor.
The latter illustration is as old as Livy—novacula cotem discindere.
The Romans made a prodigious fuss, about their beards. The first crop, calledprima barba, and sometimeslanugo, was, according to Petronius, consecrated to some god. Suetonius says, in his Life of Nero, 12—Gymnico quod in septis edebat, inter buthysiæ apparatum, barbam primam posuit, conditamque in auream pyxidem, et pretiosissimis margaritis adornatam, capitolio consecravit.—During the games, which he had given in the enclosures, and in the very midst of the splendor of the sacrifice, for the first time, he laid down his beard, and having placed it in a golden box, adorned with precious stones, he made a sacred deposit thereof, in the capitol.
After the custom of shaving had been introduced, by Mena, A. U. C. 454, it went out, for a short time, in Rome, during the time of Adrian, who as Spartianus relates, in his Life of that Emperor, having some ugly excrescences on his chin, suffered his beard to grow to conceal them—of course the courtiers followed the example of the emperor—the people, that of the courtiers. The grave concealed those excrescences, more effectually, A. D. 139, and thenavaculaagain came into use, among the Romans: Marcus Antoninus, his successor, had no excrescences on his chin.
The day, upon which a young Roman was saidponere barbam,that is, to shave for the first time, was accounted a holiday; and Juvenal says, iii. 187, he received presents from his friends.
Ovid, Trist. iv. 10, 67, dates his earliest literary exhibitions, before the people, by his first or second shave, or clip—
Carmina quum primum populo juvenilia legi,Barba resecta mihi bisve semelve fuit.
Which may be thus translated—
When first in public I beganTo read my boyish rhymes,I scarcely could be call’d a man,And had not shav’d three times.
Cæsar says of the Britons, B. G. V. 14—omni parte corporis rasa, præter caput et labrum superius—they shave entirely, excepting the head and upper lip.
Half-shaving was accounted, in the days of Samuel, I suppose, as reducing the party to a state of semi-barbarism: thus, in Samuel II. x. 4—“Wherefore Hanan took David’s servants, and shaved off the one half of their beards.”
To be denied the privilege of shaving was accounted dishonorable, among the Catti, a German nation, in the days of Tacitus; for he says, De Moribus Germanæ, 31—Apud Cattos in consensum vertit, ut primum adoleverint, crinem barbamque submittere, nec, nisi hoste cæso—It was settled among the Catti, that no young man should cut his hair, or shave his beard, till he had killed his man.
Seneca, Cons. Polyb. xxxvi. 5, blames Caius, for refusing to shave, because he had lost his sister—Idem ille Caius furiosa in constantia, modo barbam capillumque submittens—There is that Caius, clinging so absurdly to his sorrow, and suffering his hair and beard to grow on account of it.
There is an admirable letter, from Seneca to Lucillus, Ep. 114, which shows, that the dandies, in old Rome, were much like our own. He is speaking of those—qui vellunt barbam, aut intervellunt; qui labra pressius tondent et abradunt, servata et submissa cætera parte—who pull out the beard, by the roots, or particular parts of it—who clip and shave the hair, either more closely, or leave it growing, on some parts of their lips.
Juvenal, ii. 99, and Martial, vi. 64, 4, laugh at such, as use a mirror while shaving. Knives and razors ofbrass, are of great antiquity, according to the Archæological Æliana, p. 39.—Fosbroke,p. 351, says, that razors are mentioned by Homer. But I am going to a funeral, this afternoon, as an amateur, and it is time for me to shave—not with a razor of brass, however—Pradier is too light for me—I use the Chinese. Hutchinson, i. 153, says, that Leverett was the first Governor of Massachusetts, who is painted without a beard, and that he laid it aside, in Cromwell’s court.
China is the paradise of barbers. There, according to Mr. Davis, they abound. No man shaves himself, the part, to be shorn, being out of his reach. There would be no difficulty in removing the scanty hair upon their chins; but the exact tonsure of the crown, without removing one hair from the Chinaman’s long tail, that reaches to his heels, is a delicate affair. Their razors are very heavy, but superlatively keen.
Barbers were chiefly peripatetics, when I was a boy. They ran about town, and shaved at their customers’ houses. There were fewer shops. This was the genteel mode in Rome. The wealthy had their domestic barbers, as the planters have now, among their slaves. I am really surprised, that we hear of so few throats cut at the South. Some evidence of this custom—not of cutting throats—may be found, in one of the neatest epitaphs, that ever was written; the subject of which, a very young and accomplished slave-barber, has already taken a nap of eighteen hundred years. I refer to Martial’sepitaphium, on Pantagathus, a word, which, by the way, signifies one, who is good at everything, or, as we say—a man of all works. It is the fifty-second, of Book VI. Its title isEpitaphium Pantagathi, Tonsoris:
Hoc jacet in tumulo raptus puerilibus annisPantagathus, domini cura, dolorque sui,Vix tangente vagos ferro resecare capillosDoctus, et hirsutas excoluisse genas.Sic, licet, ut debes, Tellus placata, levisque;Artificis levior non potes esse manu.
In attempting a version of this, I feel, as if I were about to disfigure a pretty spinster, with a mob-cap.
Here lies Pantagathus, the slave,Petted he liv’d, and died lamented;No youth, like him could clip and shave,Since shears and razors were invented.So light his touch, you could not feelThe razor, while your cheeks were smoothing;And sat, unconscious of the steel,The operation was so soothing.Oh, mother Earth, appeas’d, since thouBack to thy grasping arms hast won him,Soft be thy hand, like his, and nowLie thou, in mercy, lightly on him.
Rochester was right; few things were ever benefited, by translation, but a bishop.
TheTonstrinæ, or barbers’ shops, in Rome, were seldom visited by any, but the humbler classes. They were sometimes called theShades. Horace, Ep. i. 7, 50, describes Philippus, an eminent lawyer, as struck with sudden envy, upon seeing Vulteius Mena, the beadle, sitting very much at ease, in one of these shades, after having been shaved, and leisurely cleaning his own nails, an office commonly performed by the barbers:—
Adrasum quendam vacua tonsoris in umbra,Cultello proprios purgantem leniter ungues.
There were she-barbers, in Rome, residing in theSaburraandArgiletum, very much such localities, as “the Hill,” formerly in Boston, orAnthony Street, in New York. Martial describes one of thesetonstrices, ii. 17—
Tonstrix Saburræ fancibus sedet primis, etc.
Some there were, of a better order. Plautus, Terence, and Theophrastus have many allusions to the barbers’ shops. They have ever been the same “otiosorum conciliabula,” that they were, when Terence wrote—resorts of the idle and garrulous. In old times—very—not now, of course—not now, a dressmaker, who was mistress of her business, knew that she was expected to turn out so much work, and so muchslander. That day has fortunately gone by. But the “barber’s tale” is the very thing that it was, in the days of Oliver Goldsmith, and it was then the very thing, that it was, as I verily believe, in the days of Ezekiel. There are many, who think, that a good story, not less than a good lather, is half the shave.
It is quitein rerum natura, that much time should beconsumed, in waiting, at thetonstrinæ—the barbers’ shops; and to make it pass agreeably, the craft have always been remarkable, for the employment of sundry appliances—amusing pictures around the walls—images and mechanical contrivances—the daily journals—poodles, monkeys, squirrels, canaries, and parrots. In the older countries, a barber’s boy was greatly in request, who could play upon thecitterne, or some other musical instrument.
If there had not been a curious assemblage ofmateriel, in an old Romantonstrina, it would not have been selected as an object for the pencil. That it was so selected, however, appears from a passage in Pliny,XXXV.37. He is writing of Pureicus—arte paucis postferendus: proposito, nescio an destruxerit se: quoniam humilia quidem sequutus, humilitatis tamen summam adeptus est gloriam. Tonstrinas, sutrinasque pinxit, et asellos, et obsonia, ac similia—He had few superiors in his art: I know not if the plan he adopted was fatal to his fame; for, though his subjects were humble, yet, in their representation, he attained the highest excellence. He painted barbers’ and shoemakers’ shops, asses, eatables, and the like.
A rude sketch of Heemskerck’s picture of a barber’s shop lies now upon my table. Here is the poodle, with a cape and fool’s cap, walking on his hind legs—the suspended bleeding basin, and other et cætera of the profession.
Little is generally known, as to the origin and import of the barber’s pole. At the beginning of the sixteenth century, surgery was in such low repute, that farriers, barbers, sow-spayers, and surgeons were much upon a level. The truth of this, in respect to surgeons and barbers, has been established by law: and, for about two hundred years, both in London and Paris, they were incorporated, as one company. I remember a case, reported by Espinasse—not having the book at hand, I cannot indicate the volume and page—which shows the judicial estimate of surgery then, compared with the practice of physic. A physician’s fees, in England, were accountedquiddam honorarium, and notmatter of lucre, and therefore could not be recovered, in an action at law. Upon an action brought for surgical services, the fees were recoverable, because surgeons, upon the testimony of Dr. Mead, were of a lower grade, having nothing to do with the pathology of diseases, and never prescribing; but simply performing certain mechanical acts; and being, like all other artificers and operatives, worthy of their hire.
Nothing can more clearly exhibit the low state of this noble science, at the time, and the humble estimation of it, by the public. Chirurgery seemed destined to grovel, in etymological bondage, χειρ εργον, a merehandicraft. Barbers and surgeons were incorporated, as one company, in the fifteenth century, in the reign of Edward IV., and were called barber-surgeons. At the close of the sixteenth century, Ambrose Paré, the greatest surgeon of his time in France, did not reject the appellation ofbarber-surgeon. Henry VIII. dissolved this union, and gave a new charter in 1540, when it was enacted, that “no person, using any shaving or barbery in London, shall occupy any surgery, letting of blood, or other matter, excepting only the drawing of teeth.” Thebarber-surgeonwas thus reduced to thebarber-dentist, which seems not so agreeable to the practitioner, at present, as the loftier appellation ofsurgeon-dentist. Sterne was right: there is something in a name. The British surgeons obtained a new charter, in 1745, and another, in 1800, and various acts have been subsequently passed, on their behalf. July 17, 1797, Lord Thurlow, in the House of Peers, opposed a new bill, which the surgeons desired to have passed. Thurlow was a man of morose temperament, and uncertain humor.
He averred, that so much of the old law was in force, that, to use his own words, “the barbers and surgeons were each to use a pole, the barbers were to have theirs blue and white, striped, with no other appendage; but the surgeons’, which was the same, in other respects, was likewise to have a gallipot and a red rag, to denote the particular nature of their vocation.”
Brand, in his Popular Antiquities, says, that the barber’s pole, used in bleeding, is represented, in an illuminated missal, of the time of Edward I., Longshanks, whose reign began in 1272. Fosbroke, in his Encyc. of Antiquities, page 414, says—“A staff, bound by a riband, was held, by persons being bled, and the pole was intended to denote the practice of phlebotomy.” According to Lord Thurlow’s statement, in the House of Peers, the pole was required, by the statute, to be used, as a sign. The first statute, incorporating the barber-surgeons, was that of Edward IV., as I have stated. The missal of Edward I., referred to by Brand, shows, that the usage was older than the law, and, doubtless, that the popular emblem was adopted, in the statute, to which Lord Thurlow refers, as still in force, in 1797.
In Brand’s Newcastle, I find, that “it is ordered, Dec. 11,1711, that periwig-making be considered part and branch of the Company of Barber-Chirurgeons.”
The history of the pole is this: A staff about three feet high, with a ball on the top, and inserted, at the bottom, in a small cross-piece, was very convenient for the person to hold, who extended his arm, as he sat down, to be bled; and a fillet, or tape, was equally convenient for the ligature. These things the barber-surgeons kept, in a corner of their shops; and, when not in use, the tape or fillet was wound or twirled round the staff. When the lawgivers called for a sign, no apter sign could be given unto them, than this identical staff and fillet; much larger of course, and to be seen of men much farther.
Ancient plays abound with allusions to the barber’scitterne, or lute, upon which not only he himself, and his apprentices were accustomed to play, but all the loiterers in thetonstrina. Much of all this may be found, in the Glossary of Archdeacon Nares, under the articleCitterne, and in Fosbroke’s Antiquities.
The commonness of its use gave rise to a proverb. In the Silent Woman, Act II., scene 2, Ben Jonson avails of it. Morose had married a woman, recommended by his barber, and whose fidelity he suspected, and the following passage occurs, between Morose and Truewit. Lond., 1816, iii. 411.