[18]“Nisi ad illam vitam quæ cum virtute degatur ampulla aut strigiles acceperit.”—Cicero,De Fin.l. iv. sec.12.[19]Balnea, vina, Venus consumunt corpora nostra,Sed faciunt vitam balnea, vina, Venus.—Martial.[20]Returning on one occasion to Europe by Belgrade, I brought some Turks by the steamer up to Vienna to show them a little of Europe. After a night on board, mylevéeproved an awkward business. In a Turkish household all the servants attend their master while he dresses. That is the time to prefer petitions and make complaints. Every one is there, and may say what he likes. On the morning in question, they were mute as statues; knowing the cause, I dared not look at them. They had seen the Europeanswash. Silence being at length broken, they began to narrate what they had seen. Among other jottings for a book of travels they would have mentioned, that apriesthad taken water in his mouth, and then slobbered it over his face. I told them that these were not my countrymen, and asked them if they had not seen the two English officers wash (I had observed from the single cabin on deck, which the captain had given up to me, canteen dishes, soap, towels, &c., going down for them); after a pause one of my Turks said, “Zavale belmester. The unfortunates! they don’t know how!”[21]Under the Jewish dispensation the body of man was held unclean, but not that of beasts. The observances of the ceremonial law were directed to awaken our sensibilities to expel the impurities attendant on every function.[22]In theJassiof Tchengis Khan, washing of the clothes was forbidden, and of the hands or person in running water: he denied that any thing was unclean.[23]Pliny, urging on Trajan the repairing of the bath of Brusa, says, “The dignity of the city and the splendour of your reign require it.”—l. x. c.25.[24]The Turkish is the poorest language in vocables; the most powerful in construction. The verb not rules only, but sustains the sentence: it is dramatic philology.[25]One of the luxuries of the Roman baths consisted in their brightness, the command of the prospect around, and in various strange contrivances. By one of these, the bather, while swimming in warm water, could see the sea; by another, the figures of the bathers within, were seen magnified without. “They were not content unless they were coloured as well as washed,” says Seneca (Epist.87).Multus ubique dies radiis ubi culmina totis,Perforat, atque alio sol improbus uritur æstu.Stat.lib. i.This excess of light in a bath, savours of indecency (SeeSuedon. Apoll. lib. ii. epist.2). It was not the early practice of Rome, nor certainly of those from whom the Romans took the bath. “Our ancestors,” says Seneca, “did not believe a bath to be warm unless it was obscure.”“Redde Lupi nobis tenebrosaque balnea Grilli.”—Mart.i.60.[26]The Roman expression,“quasi locus in balneis,”was equivalent to “first come, first served.”[27]The bathing-men give signals for what they want, by striking with the hand on the hollow of the side.[28]“Let the air of all the rooms he neither particularly hot nor cold, but of a proper temperature, and middling moist; which will be effected by plentifully pouring temperate water from the cistern, so that it may flow through every room.”—Galen.Therap. Meth.lib. x.[29]“Percurrit agili corpus arte tractatrix manumque doctum spargit omnibus membris.”—Mart.iii.82.Thetractatrixwas the female shampooer.[30]“Et summum dominæ femur exclamare coegit.”—Juvenal,Sat.vi. v.422.[31]These basins are thepelvesof the Romans.[32]“Thestrigilwas used after bathing, toremove the perspiration. The hollow part was to hold oil to soften the skin, or to allow the scraped grease to run off.”—Dennis,vol. ii. p.426.[33]Whenever our writers touch on these matters, they fall into inevitable confusion.“In the baths of the East, the bodies are cleansed by small bags of camels’ hair woven rough, or with a handful of the fine fibres of the Mekha palm-tree combed soft, and filled with fragrant saponaceous earths, which are rubbed on the skin, till the whole body is covered with froth. Similar means were employed in the baths of Greece, and the whole was afterwards cleansed off the skin by gold or silverstrigils.”—Manners and Customs of Ancient Greece,J. A. St. John,vol. ii. p.89.[34]Nut of the palm, and consequently hard and not fit to use on the person. The Moors, though they do not use soap in the bath, always use their softliffwith their soft soap, which practice the Turks have imperfectly followed.[35]“Toutes les femmes Mahometanes sont dans l’habitude de s’épiler, et cela encore par principe religieux. Elles y emploient une argile très fine (oth) d’une qualité mordante, les hommes en font de même. Le plus grand nombre cependant se sert du rasoir.”—D’Ohsson,vol. ii. p.62.[36]The Romans had the same practice, “Pilos extirpare per psilothri medicamentum.”—Pliny.Theterra Mediawas used, Dioscorides tells us, for depilation.[37]Theduretumintroduced by Augustus at Rome:“On trouve alors des lits delicieux: on s’y repose avec volupté, on y éprouve un calme et un bien-être difficiles à exprimer. C’est une sorte de régénération, dont le charme est encore augmenté par des boissons restaurantes, et surtout par un café exquis.”—D’Ohsson,t. vii. p.63.[38]“Strange as it may appear, the Orientals, both men and women, are passionately fond of indulging in this formidable luxury; and almost every European who has tried it, speaks with much satisfaction of the result. When all is done, a soft and luxurious feeling spreads itself over your body; every limb is light and free as air; the marble-like smoothness of the skin is delightful; and after all this pommelling, scrubbing, racking, par-boiling, and perspiring, you feel more enjoyment than ever you felt before.”—Chapman and Hall’sLibrary of Travel.[39]Galen (Method. Therap. l. x. c.10,) says, “Let then one of the servants throw over him a towel, and being placed upon a couch let him be wiped with sponges, and then with soft napkins.” How completely this is the Turkish plan, one familiar with the bath only will understand: explanation would be tedious.[40]If you desire to be awakened at a certain hour, you are not lugged by the shoulder or shouted at in the ear; the soles of your feet are chafed, and you wake up gently, and with an agreeable sensation. This luxury is not confined to those who have attendants, few or many; the street-porter is so awakened by his wife, or child, or brother, and he in turn renders the same service. The soles of the feet are exposed to a severity of service which no other muscles have to perform, and they require indulgent treatment; but with us they receive none.[41]Motto of the Vizir of Haroun el Raschid, when required by his master to find one which should apply at once to happiness or adversity.[42]Volney once entered a Turkish bath, and in horror and dismay, rushed out, and could never be induced to enter one again. Lord Londonderry was more submissive, and endured its tortures to the end; but rejected the coffee, and pipes, and civilities then proffered. He has given us a detail of his sufferings, which appear to have been notional. Sir G. Wilkinson, in his work on Thebes, cites them at length, and this is all that he deems it requisite to tell the strangers who arrive in Egypt, on the subject of the Hamâm.[43]The charge at Rome was a quadrat, or one farthing; children paid nothing.“Nec pueri credunt, nisi qui nondum ære lavantur.”Juvenal,Sat.ii. v.152.In some baths it would appear that even grown persons were admitted gratis.“Balneum, quo usus fuisset, sine mercede exhibuit.”—Jul.Capit.[44]A poor man will go to the shambles and cut off a bit of the meat that is hanging there, and the butcher will take no notice of it. If he goes to have a cup of coffee, and has not five parahs (one farthing), he will lay his two or three on the counter, instead of dropping them into the slit; the next customer will lay down ten and sweep them in together.[45]“On entering, they remain in the hot air, after which they immerse themselves in hot water, then they go into cold water, and then wipe off the sweat. Those who do not go from thesudatoryat once into cold water, burst out on returning to the dressing-room, into a second sweat, which at first is immoderate, and then ceases and leaves them chilly.”—Galen,Method. Med.l. x. c.2.[46]While it is essential to cleanliness to clear away the oily matter that exudes from the skin, the oil afterwards applied to the cleansed body, seems to be beneficial, and to keep open instead of closing the pores.[47]The two instruments were slung together. Theguttuswas round, and from its round flat orifice, the oil distilled.Guttatim tenticulari forma, terite ambitu, pressula rotunditate.—Apuleius.On coins, vases, and bas-reliefs, it has been mistaken for the pomegranate, for a bulbous root, or a lustral vase. A curious Greek papyrus, in which a reward is offered for a runaway slave, or Lechythophoros, has cleared this matter from all ambiguity. Mr. Letronne has restored and translated the papyrus. It is also to be seen in the Lycian tomb, of which a cast is in the British Museum, and one of the groups given in colours in Fellows’s “Lycia.”[48]Αὐτολήκυθος, signifies a poor man.Οὐδ’ ἐστὶν αὐτῇ στλεγγὶς οὐδὲ λήκυθος.—Aristophanes.Ἐμαυτῷ Βαλανεύσω, was equivalent to “I am my own butler.” “Have you dreamt of Lechyth, or Xystra? that is the sign of a woman that attends to her household (οὐκουρὸν) or of a faithful handmaid.”—Artemid.Oneiroc.i.64.[49]I find the most convenient substitute, a vase holding about two gallons of water, with a spout like that of a tea-urn, only three times the length, placed on a stand about four feet high, with a tub below: hot or cold water can be used; the water may be very hot, as the stream that flows is small. It runs for a quarter of an hour, or twenty minutes. The Castilian soap should be used in preference to the made-up soaps of England. Of English soaps, the common yellow washing soap is the best. N.B. A clean sheet on the dressing-room floor and no slippers.[50]“Neat,” and “proper,” are two words which we have changed from their original sense to cleanliness.[51]“Granting that the English are tolerably clean in the matter of their faces and hands, their houses and clothes, it must be confessed that they do not seem sufficiently impressed with the importance of keeping their whole bodies clean. Suppose the English were the cleanest people in the world, it would be fearful to think, when we know what they are, how dirty the rest of the world must be.”—Family Economist,p.40.[52]Theabdestof the Mussulman consists in washing hands to the elbow, feet, face, and neck, five times a day in cold water without soap. Thewadhanof the Jews is only three times, and does not extend to the feet. The priests washed feet and hands.[53]Spitting, blowing the nose, weeping, or perspiring, do not entailas acts, the necessity of ablution, which follows every other secretion. While a sore runs, they are defiled and cannot pray. If they have notspoiled their abdest, the washing before prayers need not be repeated, but the abdest is spoiled by a tear, or by perspiration.[54]Deut. xxiii.12.[55]See D’Ohsson,vol. ii. p.8, 57, 58.[56]The defilement attached to the secretions is conveyed in the natural sense of the antithesis used by Christ (Matt, xv., Markvii.), between “what proceedeth from a man,” and “what entereth into a man.”[57]I was desirous to bring to Europe a young Turk, and he was nothing loath: his mother, however, made objections, which I could not get from him. At last, he said, “You must talk to her yourself.” I went consequently; and when I introduced the subject, raising up her two arms before her face as they do when depressed or abject, with the hands turned down and wringing them, she exclaimed: “Vai! Vai! are not your ships made fast under my windows, and do I not see how the Franks wash?”[58]A plan has recently been successfully adopted for drying horses after hunting. Two men, one on each side, throw over him buckets of water as hot as he can bear it: he is then scraped and rubbed with chamois leather, the head and ears carefully dried with a rubber, and his clothing put on. In twenty minutes he is perfectly dry, and there is no fear of his breaking out again: the old plan of rubbing him dry took from one to two hours of very hard work, and he generally broke out once or twice, and would often be found in a profuse sweat at twelve or one o’clock at night. The bath might be adopted for horses. The Muscovites used to mount from the dinner table on horseback; at present we shampoo our horses, and clear off the epidermis, while we bestow no such care on our own bodies.[59]“The chiefs of either sex are, with very few exceptions, remarkably tall and corpulent. For this striking peculiarity various reasons may be suggested.... But in addition to any or all of these possibilities one thing is certain, that the easy and luxurious life of a chief has had very considerable influence in the matter: he or she, as the case may be, fares sumptuously every day, or rather every hour, and takes little or no exercise, while the constant habit of being shampooed after every regular meal, and oftener, if desirable or expedient, promotes circulation and digestion, without superinducing either exhaustion or fatigue.“Whatever may be the cause or causes of the magnitude of the Patricians, the effect itself so seldom fails to be produced, that beyond all doubt, bulk and rank are almost indissolubly connected together in the popular mind, the great in person being, without the help of a play upon words, great also in power.”—Sir George Simpson’sVoyage round the World,vol. ii. p.51.[60]“Balneis calidis constitutis, ut remedium ægrotantibus et lenimen labore defessis afferantur, quæ sanè curatio longè melior est quam medici parum periti medela.”[61]MS.of Dr. Meryon, the only practical and really useful essay which I have seen on the bath, and which, I trust, will not be left on the shelf.[62]“Rectè olet ubi nihil olet.”—Plautus.[63]In the Russian bath the heat is obtained, like that of the Mexicans, by stones heated in a furnace, and on which water is thrown. They have seats at different heights, and by ascending increase the temperature (theconcamerata sudatio, as painted in the baths of Titus). They have a cold douche, which descends from the top of the chamber, and is repeated twice during the bathing. They do not shampoo, but with a bunch of birch, with the leaves on, thrash the body all over, laying it along, first on the back and then on the face.[64]The vessels running through the skin, would extend in a straight line twenty-five miles: the respiratories coming to the surface of the body, and opening through the epidermis, amount to seven millions.[65]“The heart at every contraction expels about two ounces of blood, and at sixty in a minute one hundred and sixty ounces are sent forth; in three minutes the whole blood (about thirty pounds), must pass through the heart, and in one hour this takes place twenty times. Who,—reflecting on the tissues to be permeated, the functions to be discharged, the secretions to be formed from, and the nutritious substances to be taken into the circulating fluid; and reflecting upon how soon each particle, each atom of blood, after having been deteriorated in its constitution, and rendered unfit for the discharge of its important duties, is again driven through the lungs, and again aerated,—can retire from the investigation without feelings ennobled, and the whole man rendered better!”—Dr. Robertson.[66]The trough full of hot water called a bath, used to cost in London at least one shilling and sixpence, so that persons with less than 200l.a year could not afford to use them. In Paris, with fuel and water so much dearer, baths can be had as low as one-third. The recent washing-houses are something, but only as a commencement, and an earnest. Such contrivances will not change a people’s taste.[67]Everything is dearer in England than in Turkey, except those things which are wanting for the bath: fuel is at a third of the cost, water is infinitely more abundant, and we have the same advantages over every other capital of Europe. When the charge for the bath was at Rome a quadrant, the price of wheat differed little from what it is at present in England.[68]“Two patients in adjoining beds, one seventy-five, the other fifty, father and son, were suffering from diseased liver, and other effects of intemperance. The attention of the party (the governors, inspecting the Bedford Infirmary) being drawn to these cases, I observed that the elder would recover, and the younger would not. On being asked the grounds for my opinion, I said, the one is the son of a beer-drinking, the other of a buttermilk-drinking father. The event confirmed my anticipation. During the youth of the elder, he had never tasted beer or tea,—milk and buttermilk were then the people’s drink.”[69]No one entered a church without washing the face and hands.—Tertull.de Orat.cap. ii.Clemens Alexandrinus, prescribing rules to Christians for bathing, gives four reasons; cleanliness, health, warmth, pleasure.—Pædag.l. iii. c. 9.[70]The Mussulmans say, “the physician is before the Imaum, for if your bowels are disordered you cannot play.” Like the Romans, they have superseded the physician by the bath. The Brahmins hold disease to be sinful.“What worship is there not in mere washing! perhaps one of the most moral things a man, in common cases, has it in his power to do. This consciousness of perfect outer pureness—that to thy skin there now adheres no foreign speck of imperfection—how it radiates on thee, with cunning symbolic influences, to thy very soul! Thou hast an increase of tendency towards all good things whatsoever. The oldest eastern sages with joy and holy gratitude had felt it to be so, and that it was the Maker’s gift and will. It remains a religious duty in the East. Nor could Herr Professor Strauss, when I put the question, deny that for us, at present, it is still such here in the West. To that dingy operative emerging from his soot mill, what is the first duty I will prescribe, and offer help towards? That he clean the skin of him. Can he, pray, by any ascertaining method? One knows not to a certainty; but, with a sufficiency of soap and water, he can wash. Even the dull English feel something of this: they have a saying, 'Cleanliness is near of kin to godliness:’ yet never in any country saw I men worse washed, and, in a climate drenched with the softest cloud water, such a scarcity of baths.”—Sauerteig.[71]Being present with a Mussulman at one of the most splendid ceremonies of the Catholic church, I was anxious to note the impression he received. As he was silent, I put questions to him; called his attention to the incense, the chants, the dresses, the white lace over the coloured vestments—but all in vain. I afterwards asked him what had been passing in his mind. He replied, it was very magnificent, adding, “I could only think of their feet.”[72]The Duke of Wellington, notwithstanding the remonstrances of the clergyman of the parish, had the pavement of a bath, discovered at Silchester, filled in, because his tenant was annoyed by people crossing a field to look at it.“D O M. The walls, which stranger, you behold, are the remains of the baths which the city of Pisa anciently used. Of these, consuming time has destroyed the rest, and left only the Sudatorium, which, overturned neither by an innumerable series of ages, nor by the injuries of barbarians, allures the eye studious of antiquity. Approach and contemplate, and you will see the beautiful form of the edifice, you will observe the plan of the lights, and how the heat is sent through tubes. You will have to complain of no concealment, nor will you affirm that anything of this kind can be found more perfect elsewhere. And you will return thanks to the great Duke CosmosIII.; who, lest, this illustrious monument should altogether perish, made it his peculiar care and custody.”—Inscription on the Roman bath at Pisa.[73]“Nam prisco more tradiderunt brachia et crura quotidie abluere quæ scilicet sordes opere collegerant.”—Seneca,Ep.87.[74]By the merest accident I made this discovery. A lady mentioned to me, “a practice of sweating,” which she had heard of in her childhood among the peasantry. I subjoin an extract of a letter written in reply to inquiries.“With respect to the sweating-houses, as they are called, I remember about forty years ago, seeing one in the island of Rathlin, and shall try to give you a description of it:—It was built of basalt stones, very much in the shape of a bee-hive, with a row of stones inside, for the person to sit on when undergoing the operation. There was a hole at the top and one near the ground where the person crept in, and seated him or herself; the stones having been heated in the same way as an oven for baking bread is; the hole on the top being covered with a sod, while being heated; but, I suppose, removed to admit the person to breathe. Before entering, the patient was stripped quite naked, and on coming out, dressed again in the open air. The process was reckoned a sovereign cure for rheumatism and all sorts of pains and aches. They are fearful-looking things, as well as I remember.”[75]In the fifteenth century, baths were still in common use in Spain; for a law of Castile forbids the Moors and the Jews to bathe with the Christians.[76]A Greek sailor once sat down to eat with me with dirty hands; observing my look of astonishment, he said, flourishing them, “No one will accuse me of beingΤουρκόλατρος(worshipper of the Turks).” What kind of people must that be whose enemies make their patriotism consist in filth![77]Dr. Meryon.[78]That horrid sea-water in which a savage will not bathe unless he has fresh water to rinse himself, is one of the infatuations that utterly bewilder one. Bathers of course in the sea get air and exercise, but do not imagine that there is virtue in impure water, or sense in exposure of delicate forms to cold and chill.
[18]“Nisi ad illam vitam quæ cum virtute degatur ampulla aut strigiles acceperit.”—Cicero,De Fin.l. iv. sec.12.
[19]
Balnea, vina, Venus consumunt corpora nostra,Sed faciunt vitam balnea, vina, Venus.—Martial.
Balnea, vina, Venus consumunt corpora nostra,Sed faciunt vitam balnea, vina, Venus.—Martial.
Balnea, vina, Venus consumunt corpora nostra,
Sed faciunt vitam balnea, vina, Venus.—Martial.
[20]Returning on one occasion to Europe by Belgrade, I brought some Turks by the steamer up to Vienna to show them a little of Europe. After a night on board, mylevéeproved an awkward business. In a Turkish household all the servants attend their master while he dresses. That is the time to prefer petitions and make complaints. Every one is there, and may say what he likes. On the morning in question, they were mute as statues; knowing the cause, I dared not look at them. They had seen the Europeanswash. Silence being at length broken, they began to narrate what they had seen. Among other jottings for a book of travels they would have mentioned, that apriesthad taken water in his mouth, and then slobbered it over his face. I told them that these were not my countrymen, and asked them if they had not seen the two English officers wash (I had observed from the single cabin on deck, which the captain had given up to me, canteen dishes, soap, towels, &c., going down for them); after a pause one of my Turks said, “Zavale belmester. The unfortunates! they don’t know how!”
[21]Under the Jewish dispensation the body of man was held unclean, but not that of beasts. The observances of the ceremonial law were directed to awaken our sensibilities to expel the impurities attendant on every function.
[22]In theJassiof Tchengis Khan, washing of the clothes was forbidden, and of the hands or person in running water: he denied that any thing was unclean.
[23]Pliny, urging on Trajan the repairing of the bath of Brusa, says, “The dignity of the city and the splendour of your reign require it.”—l. x. c.25.
[24]The Turkish is the poorest language in vocables; the most powerful in construction. The verb not rules only, but sustains the sentence: it is dramatic philology.
[25]One of the luxuries of the Roman baths consisted in their brightness, the command of the prospect around, and in various strange contrivances. By one of these, the bather, while swimming in warm water, could see the sea; by another, the figures of the bathers within, were seen magnified without. “They were not content unless they were coloured as well as washed,” says Seneca (Epist.87).
Multus ubique dies radiis ubi culmina totis,Perforat, atque alio sol improbus uritur æstu.Stat.lib. i.
Multus ubique dies radiis ubi culmina totis,Perforat, atque alio sol improbus uritur æstu.Stat.lib. i.
Multus ubique dies radiis ubi culmina totis,
Perforat, atque alio sol improbus uritur æstu.
Stat.lib. i.
This excess of light in a bath, savours of indecency (SeeSuedon. Apoll. lib. ii. epist.2). It was not the early practice of Rome, nor certainly of those from whom the Romans took the bath. “Our ancestors,” says Seneca, “did not believe a bath to be warm unless it was obscure.”
“Redde Lupi nobis tenebrosaque balnea Grilli.”—Mart.i.60.
[26]The Roman expression,“quasi locus in balneis,”was equivalent to “first come, first served.”
[27]The bathing-men give signals for what they want, by striking with the hand on the hollow of the side.
[28]“Let the air of all the rooms he neither particularly hot nor cold, but of a proper temperature, and middling moist; which will be effected by plentifully pouring temperate water from the cistern, so that it may flow through every room.”—Galen.Therap. Meth.lib. x.
[29]“Percurrit agili corpus arte tractatrix manumque doctum spargit omnibus membris.”—Mart.iii.82.
Thetractatrixwas the female shampooer.
[30]“Et summum dominæ femur exclamare coegit.”—Juvenal,Sat.vi. v.422.
[31]These basins are thepelvesof the Romans.
[32]“Thestrigilwas used after bathing, toremove the perspiration. The hollow part was to hold oil to soften the skin, or to allow the scraped grease to run off.”—Dennis,vol. ii. p.426.
[33]Whenever our writers touch on these matters, they fall into inevitable confusion.
“In the baths of the East, the bodies are cleansed by small bags of camels’ hair woven rough, or with a handful of the fine fibres of the Mekha palm-tree combed soft, and filled with fragrant saponaceous earths, which are rubbed on the skin, till the whole body is covered with froth. Similar means were employed in the baths of Greece, and the whole was afterwards cleansed off the skin by gold or silverstrigils.”—Manners and Customs of Ancient Greece,J. A. St. John,vol. ii. p.89.
[34]Nut of the palm, and consequently hard and not fit to use on the person. The Moors, though they do not use soap in the bath, always use their softliffwith their soft soap, which practice the Turks have imperfectly followed.
[35]“Toutes les femmes Mahometanes sont dans l’habitude de s’épiler, et cela encore par principe religieux. Elles y emploient une argile très fine (oth) d’une qualité mordante, les hommes en font de même. Le plus grand nombre cependant se sert du rasoir.”—D’Ohsson,vol. ii. p.62.
[36]The Romans had the same practice, “Pilos extirpare per psilothri medicamentum.”—Pliny.Theterra Mediawas used, Dioscorides tells us, for depilation.
[37]Theduretumintroduced by Augustus at Rome:“On trouve alors des lits delicieux: on s’y repose avec volupté, on y éprouve un calme et un bien-être difficiles à exprimer. C’est une sorte de régénération, dont le charme est encore augmenté par des boissons restaurantes, et surtout par un café exquis.”—D’Ohsson,t. vii. p.63.
[38]“Strange as it may appear, the Orientals, both men and women, are passionately fond of indulging in this formidable luxury; and almost every European who has tried it, speaks with much satisfaction of the result. When all is done, a soft and luxurious feeling spreads itself over your body; every limb is light and free as air; the marble-like smoothness of the skin is delightful; and after all this pommelling, scrubbing, racking, par-boiling, and perspiring, you feel more enjoyment than ever you felt before.”—Chapman and Hall’sLibrary of Travel.
[39]Galen (Method. Therap. l. x. c.10,) says, “Let then one of the servants throw over him a towel, and being placed upon a couch let him be wiped with sponges, and then with soft napkins.” How completely this is the Turkish plan, one familiar with the bath only will understand: explanation would be tedious.
[40]If you desire to be awakened at a certain hour, you are not lugged by the shoulder or shouted at in the ear; the soles of your feet are chafed, and you wake up gently, and with an agreeable sensation. This luxury is not confined to those who have attendants, few or many; the street-porter is so awakened by his wife, or child, or brother, and he in turn renders the same service. The soles of the feet are exposed to a severity of service which no other muscles have to perform, and they require indulgent treatment; but with us they receive none.
[41]Motto of the Vizir of Haroun el Raschid, when required by his master to find one which should apply at once to happiness or adversity.
[42]Volney once entered a Turkish bath, and in horror and dismay, rushed out, and could never be induced to enter one again. Lord Londonderry was more submissive, and endured its tortures to the end; but rejected the coffee, and pipes, and civilities then proffered. He has given us a detail of his sufferings, which appear to have been notional. Sir G. Wilkinson, in his work on Thebes, cites them at length, and this is all that he deems it requisite to tell the strangers who arrive in Egypt, on the subject of the Hamâm.
[43]The charge at Rome was a quadrat, or one farthing; children paid nothing.
“Nec pueri credunt, nisi qui nondum ære lavantur.”Juvenal,Sat.ii. v.152.
“Nec pueri credunt, nisi qui nondum ære lavantur.”Juvenal,Sat.ii. v.152.
“Nec pueri credunt, nisi qui nondum ære lavantur.”
Juvenal,Sat.ii. v.152.
In some baths it would appear that even grown persons were admitted gratis.
“Balneum, quo usus fuisset, sine mercede exhibuit.”—Jul.Capit.
[44]A poor man will go to the shambles and cut off a bit of the meat that is hanging there, and the butcher will take no notice of it. If he goes to have a cup of coffee, and has not five parahs (one farthing), he will lay his two or three on the counter, instead of dropping them into the slit; the next customer will lay down ten and sweep them in together.
[45]“On entering, they remain in the hot air, after which they immerse themselves in hot water, then they go into cold water, and then wipe off the sweat. Those who do not go from thesudatoryat once into cold water, burst out on returning to the dressing-room, into a second sweat, which at first is immoderate, and then ceases and leaves them chilly.”—Galen,Method. Med.l. x. c.2.
[46]While it is essential to cleanliness to clear away the oily matter that exudes from the skin, the oil afterwards applied to the cleansed body, seems to be beneficial, and to keep open instead of closing the pores.
[47]The two instruments were slung together. Theguttuswas round, and from its round flat orifice, the oil distilled.Guttatim tenticulari forma, terite ambitu, pressula rotunditate.—Apuleius.On coins, vases, and bas-reliefs, it has been mistaken for the pomegranate, for a bulbous root, or a lustral vase. A curious Greek papyrus, in which a reward is offered for a runaway slave, or Lechythophoros, has cleared this matter from all ambiguity. Mr. Letronne has restored and translated the papyrus. It is also to be seen in the Lycian tomb, of which a cast is in the British Museum, and one of the groups given in colours in Fellows’s “Lycia.”
[48]Αὐτολήκυθος, signifies a poor man.
Οὐδ’ ἐστὶν αὐτῇ στλεγγὶς οὐδὲ λήκυθος.—Aristophanes.
Ἐμαυτῷ Βαλανεύσω, was equivalent to “I am my own butler.” “Have you dreamt of Lechyth, or Xystra? that is the sign of a woman that attends to her household (οὐκουρὸν) or of a faithful handmaid.”—Artemid.Oneiroc.i.64.
[49]I find the most convenient substitute, a vase holding about two gallons of water, with a spout like that of a tea-urn, only three times the length, placed on a stand about four feet high, with a tub below: hot or cold water can be used; the water may be very hot, as the stream that flows is small. It runs for a quarter of an hour, or twenty minutes. The Castilian soap should be used in preference to the made-up soaps of England. Of English soaps, the common yellow washing soap is the best. N.B. A clean sheet on the dressing-room floor and no slippers.
[50]“Neat,” and “proper,” are two words which we have changed from their original sense to cleanliness.
[51]“Granting that the English are tolerably clean in the matter of their faces and hands, their houses and clothes, it must be confessed that they do not seem sufficiently impressed with the importance of keeping their whole bodies clean. Suppose the English were the cleanest people in the world, it would be fearful to think, when we know what they are, how dirty the rest of the world must be.”—Family Economist,p.40.
[52]Theabdestof the Mussulman consists in washing hands to the elbow, feet, face, and neck, five times a day in cold water without soap. Thewadhanof the Jews is only three times, and does not extend to the feet. The priests washed feet and hands.
[53]Spitting, blowing the nose, weeping, or perspiring, do not entailas acts, the necessity of ablution, which follows every other secretion. While a sore runs, they are defiled and cannot pray. If they have notspoiled their abdest, the washing before prayers need not be repeated, but the abdest is spoiled by a tear, or by perspiration.
[54]Deut. xxiii.12.
[55]See D’Ohsson,vol. ii. p.8, 57, 58.
[56]The defilement attached to the secretions is conveyed in the natural sense of the antithesis used by Christ (Matt, xv., Markvii.), between “what proceedeth from a man,” and “what entereth into a man.”
[57]I was desirous to bring to Europe a young Turk, and he was nothing loath: his mother, however, made objections, which I could not get from him. At last, he said, “You must talk to her yourself.” I went consequently; and when I introduced the subject, raising up her two arms before her face as they do when depressed or abject, with the hands turned down and wringing them, she exclaimed: “Vai! Vai! are not your ships made fast under my windows, and do I not see how the Franks wash?”
[58]A plan has recently been successfully adopted for drying horses after hunting. Two men, one on each side, throw over him buckets of water as hot as he can bear it: he is then scraped and rubbed with chamois leather, the head and ears carefully dried with a rubber, and his clothing put on. In twenty minutes he is perfectly dry, and there is no fear of his breaking out again: the old plan of rubbing him dry took from one to two hours of very hard work, and he generally broke out once or twice, and would often be found in a profuse sweat at twelve or one o’clock at night. The bath might be adopted for horses. The Muscovites used to mount from the dinner table on horseback; at present we shampoo our horses, and clear off the epidermis, while we bestow no such care on our own bodies.
[59]“The chiefs of either sex are, with very few exceptions, remarkably tall and corpulent. For this striking peculiarity various reasons may be suggested.... But in addition to any or all of these possibilities one thing is certain, that the easy and luxurious life of a chief has had very considerable influence in the matter: he or she, as the case may be, fares sumptuously every day, or rather every hour, and takes little or no exercise, while the constant habit of being shampooed after every regular meal, and oftener, if desirable or expedient, promotes circulation and digestion, without superinducing either exhaustion or fatigue.
“Whatever may be the cause or causes of the magnitude of the Patricians, the effect itself so seldom fails to be produced, that beyond all doubt, bulk and rank are almost indissolubly connected together in the popular mind, the great in person being, without the help of a play upon words, great also in power.”—Sir George Simpson’sVoyage round the World,vol. ii. p.51.
[60]“Balneis calidis constitutis, ut remedium ægrotantibus et lenimen labore defessis afferantur, quæ sanè curatio longè melior est quam medici parum periti medela.”
[61]MS.of Dr. Meryon, the only practical and really useful essay which I have seen on the bath, and which, I trust, will not be left on the shelf.
[62]“Rectè olet ubi nihil olet.”—Plautus.
[63]In the Russian bath the heat is obtained, like that of the Mexicans, by stones heated in a furnace, and on which water is thrown. They have seats at different heights, and by ascending increase the temperature (theconcamerata sudatio, as painted in the baths of Titus). They have a cold douche, which descends from the top of the chamber, and is repeated twice during the bathing. They do not shampoo, but with a bunch of birch, with the leaves on, thrash the body all over, laying it along, first on the back and then on the face.
[64]The vessels running through the skin, would extend in a straight line twenty-five miles: the respiratories coming to the surface of the body, and opening through the epidermis, amount to seven millions.
[65]“The heart at every contraction expels about two ounces of blood, and at sixty in a minute one hundred and sixty ounces are sent forth; in three minutes the whole blood (about thirty pounds), must pass through the heart, and in one hour this takes place twenty times. Who,—reflecting on the tissues to be permeated, the functions to be discharged, the secretions to be formed from, and the nutritious substances to be taken into the circulating fluid; and reflecting upon how soon each particle, each atom of blood, after having been deteriorated in its constitution, and rendered unfit for the discharge of its important duties, is again driven through the lungs, and again aerated,—can retire from the investigation without feelings ennobled, and the whole man rendered better!”—Dr. Robertson.
[66]The trough full of hot water called a bath, used to cost in London at least one shilling and sixpence, so that persons with less than 200l.a year could not afford to use them. In Paris, with fuel and water so much dearer, baths can be had as low as one-third. The recent washing-houses are something, but only as a commencement, and an earnest. Such contrivances will not change a people’s taste.
[67]Everything is dearer in England than in Turkey, except those things which are wanting for the bath: fuel is at a third of the cost, water is infinitely more abundant, and we have the same advantages over every other capital of Europe. When the charge for the bath was at Rome a quadrant, the price of wheat differed little from what it is at present in England.
[68]“Two patients in adjoining beds, one seventy-five, the other fifty, father and son, were suffering from diseased liver, and other effects of intemperance. The attention of the party (the governors, inspecting the Bedford Infirmary) being drawn to these cases, I observed that the elder would recover, and the younger would not. On being asked the grounds for my opinion, I said, the one is the son of a beer-drinking, the other of a buttermilk-drinking father. The event confirmed my anticipation. During the youth of the elder, he had never tasted beer or tea,—milk and buttermilk were then the people’s drink.”
[69]No one entered a church without washing the face and hands.—Tertull.de Orat.cap. ii.
Clemens Alexandrinus, prescribing rules to Christians for bathing, gives four reasons; cleanliness, health, warmth, pleasure.—Pædag.l. iii. c. 9.
[70]The Mussulmans say, “the physician is before the Imaum, for if your bowels are disordered you cannot play.” Like the Romans, they have superseded the physician by the bath. The Brahmins hold disease to be sinful.
“What worship is there not in mere washing! perhaps one of the most moral things a man, in common cases, has it in his power to do. This consciousness of perfect outer pureness—that to thy skin there now adheres no foreign speck of imperfection—how it radiates on thee, with cunning symbolic influences, to thy very soul! Thou hast an increase of tendency towards all good things whatsoever. The oldest eastern sages with joy and holy gratitude had felt it to be so, and that it was the Maker’s gift and will. It remains a religious duty in the East. Nor could Herr Professor Strauss, when I put the question, deny that for us, at present, it is still such here in the West. To that dingy operative emerging from his soot mill, what is the first duty I will prescribe, and offer help towards? That he clean the skin of him. Can he, pray, by any ascertaining method? One knows not to a certainty; but, with a sufficiency of soap and water, he can wash. Even the dull English feel something of this: they have a saying, 'Cleanliness is near of kin to godliness:’ yet never in any country saw I men worse washed, and, in a climate drenched with the softest cloud water, such a scarcity of baths.”—Sauerteig.
[71]Being present with a Mussulman at one of the most splendid ceremonies of the Catholic church, I was anxious to note the impression he received. As he was silent, I put questions to him; called his attention to the incense, the chants, the dresses, the white lace over the coloured vestments—but all in vain. I afterwards asked him what had been passing in his mind. He replied, it was very magnificent, adding, “I could only think of their feet.”
[72]The Duke of Wellington, notwithstanding the remonstrances of the clergyman of the parish, had the pavement of a bath, discovered at Silchester, filled in, because his tenant was annoyed by people crossing a field to look at it.
“D O M. The walls, which stranger, you behold, are the remains of the baths which the city of Pisa anciently used. Of these, consuming time has destroyed the rest, and left only the Sudatorium, which, overturned neither by an innumerable series of ages, nor by the injuries of barbarians, allures the eye studious of antiquity. Approach and contemplate, and you will see the beautiful form of the edifice, you will observe the plan of the lights, and how the heat is sent through tubes. You will have to complain of no concealment, nor will you affirm that anything of this kind can be found more perfect elsewhere. And you will return thanks to the great Duke CosmosIII.; who, lest, this illustrious monument should altogether perish, made it his peculiar care and custody.”—Inscription on the Roman bath at Pisa.
[73]“Nam prisco more tradiderunt brachia et crura quotidie abluere quæ scilicet sordes opere collegerant.”—Seneca,Ep.87.
[74]By the merest accident I made this discovery. A lady mentioned to me, “a practice of sweating,” which she had heard of in her childhood among the peasantry. I subjoin an extract of a letter written in reply to inquiries.
“With respect to the sweating-houses, as they are called, I remember about forty years ago, seeing one in the island of Rathlin, and shall try to give you a description of it:—It was built of basalt stones, very much in the shape of a bee-hive, with a row of stones inside, for the person to sit on when undergoing the operation. There was a hole at the top and one near the ground where the person crept in, and seated him or herself; the stones having been heated in the same way as an oven for baking bread is; the hole on the top being covered with a sod, while being heated; but, I suppose, removed to admit the person to breathe. Before entering, the patient was stripped quite naked, and on coming out, dressed again in the open air. The process was reckoned a sovereign cure for rheumatism and all sorts of pains and aches. They are fearful-looking things, as well as I remember.”
[75]In the fifteenth century, baths were still in common use in Spain; for a law of Castile forbids the Moors and the Jews to bathe with the Christians.
[76]A Greek sailor once sat down to eat with me with dirty hands; observing my look of astonishment, he said, flourishing them, “No one will accuse me of beingΤουρκόλατρος(worshipper of the Turks).” What kind of people must that be whose enemies make their patriotism consist in filth!
[77]Dr. Meryon.
[78]That horrid sea-water in which a savage will not bathe unless he has fresh water to rinse himself, is one of the infatuations that utterly bewilder one. Bathers of course in the sea get air and exercise, but do not imagine that there is virtue in impure water, or sense in exposure of delicate forms to cold and chill.