Part 2 (1/2)
This is called antiquated virginity; it is a period when elderly unmarried ladies are supposed to be bearing apes about in leading-strings, as a punishment, because, when those elderly unmarried ladies were young and beautiful, they made monkies of mankind. Old maids are supposed to be ill-natured and crabbed, as wine kept too long on the lees will turn to vinegar.
{49}Not to be partial to either s.e.x [_takes the head up_], as a companion to the Old Maid, here is the head of An Old Bachelor. These old bachelors are mere bullies; they are perpetually abusing matrimony, without ever daring to accept of the challenge. When they are in company they are ever exclaiming against hen-pecked husbands, saying, if they were married, their wives should never go any where without asking their lords and masters' leave; and if they were married, the children should never cry, nor the servants commit a fault: they'd set the house to rights; they would do every thing. But the lion-like talkers abroad are mere baa-lambs at home, being generally dupes and slaves to some termagant mistress, against whose imperiousness they dare not open their lips, {50}but are frightened even if she frowns. Old bachelors, in this, resemble your pretenders to atheism, who make a mock in public of what in private they tremble at and fall down to. When they become superannuated, they set up for suitors, they ogle through spectacles, and sing love songs to ladies with catarrhs by way of symphonies, and they address a young lady with, ”Come, my dear, I'll put on my spectacles and pin your handkerchief for you; I'll sing you a love song; 'How can you, lovely Nancy!'” &c. [_Laughs aloud._] How droll to hear the dotards aping youth, And talk of love's delights without a tooth!
[_Gives the head off._]
{51}It is something odd that ladies shall have their charms all abroad in this manner [_takes the head_], and the very next moment this shall come souse over their _heads_, like an extinguisher. [_Pulls the calash over._] This is a hood in high taste at the upper end of the town; and this [_takes the head_] a hood in high taste at the lower end of the town. Not more different are these two heads in their dresses than they are in their manner of conversation: this makes use of a delicate dialect, it being thought polite p.r.o.nunciation to say instead of cannot, _ca'ant_; must not _ma'ant_; shall not, _sha'ant_, This clipping of letters would be extremely detrimental to the current coin of conversation, did not these good dames make ample amends by adding supernumerary syllables when they talk of _break-fastes_, and _toastesses_, and running their heads against the posta.s.ses to avoid the wild _beastesses_. These female orators, brought up at the bar of Billingsgate, have a peculiar way of expressing themselves, which, however indelicate it may seem to more civilized ears, is exactly conformable to the way of ancient oratory. The difference between ancient and modern oratory consists in saying something or nothing to the purpose. Some people talk without saying any thing; some people {52}don't care what they say; some married men would be glad to have nothing to say to their wives; and some husbands would be full as glad if their wives had not any thing to say to them. [_ Gives the head off._] Ancient oratory is the gift of just persuasion; modern oratory the knack of putting words, not things, together; for speech-makers now are estimated, not by the merit, but by the length of their harangues; they are minuted as we do galloping horses, and their goodness rated according as they hold out against time. For example, a gentleman lately coming into a coffee-house, and expressing himself highly pleased with some debates which he had just then heard, one of his acquaintance begged the favour that he would tell the company what the debates were about.
”About, Sir!--Yes, Sir.--About!--what were they debating about? Why they were about five hours long.” ”But what did they say, Sir?” ”What did they say, Sir? Why one man said every thing; he was up two hours, three quarters, nineteen seconds, and five eighths, by my watch, which is the best stop-watch in England; so, if I don't know what he said, who should? for I had my eye upon my watch all the time he was speaking.”
”Which side was he of?” ”Why {53}he was of my side, I stood close by him all the time.”
Here are the busts of two ancient laughing and crying Philosophers, or orators. [_Takes the two heads up._] These in their life-time were heads, of two powerful factions, called the Groaners and the Grinners.
_(Holds one head in each hand.)_ This Don Dismal's faction, is a representation of that discontented part of mankind who are always railing at the times, and the world, and the people of the world: This is a good-natured fellow, that made the best of every thing: and this Don Dismal would attack his brother--”Oh, brother! brother! brother!
what will this world come to?” ”The same place it set out from this day twelve-month.” ”When will the nation's debt be paid {54}off?” ”Will you pa.s.s your word for it?” ”These are very slippery times--very slippery times.” ”They are always so in frosty weather.” ”What's become of our liberty?--Where shall we find liberty?” ”In Ireland, to be sure.” ”I can't bear to see such times.” ”Shut your eyes then.” [_ Gives the heads off._]
It may seem strange to those spectators [_takes the head_] who are unacquainted with the reasons that induce ladies to appear in such caricatures, how that delicate s.e.x can walk under the weight of such enormous head-coverings; but what will not English hearts endure for the good of their country? And it's all for the good of their country the ladies wear such appearances; for, while mankind are such enemies to Old England as to run wool to France, our ladies, by making use of wool as part of their head-dresses [_lets down the tail and takes out the wool_], keep it at home, and encourage the woollen manufactory. [_Takes off the head._]
But, as all our fas.h.i.+ons descend to our inferiors, a servant maid, in the Peak of Derbys.h.i.+re, having purchased an old tete from a puppet-show woman, and being at a loss for some of this wool to stuff out the curls with, fancied a whisp of hay might {55}do. [_Takes the head._] Here is the servant maid, with her new-purchased finery; and here is her new-fas.h.i.+oned stuffing. But, before she had finished at her garret dressing-table, a ring at the door called her down stairs to receive a letter from the postboy; turning back to go into the house again, the postboy's horse, being hungry, laid hold of the head-dress by way of forage. Never may the fair s.e.x meet with a worse misfortune; but may the ladies, always hereafter, preserve their heads in good order. Amen.
Horace, in describing a fine woman, makes use of two Latin words, which are, _simplex munditiis_. Now these two words cannot be properly translated; {56}their best interpretation is that of a young Female Quaker. [_Takes the head._] Such is the effect of native neatness.
Here is no bundle of hair to set her off, no jewels to adorn her, nor artificial complexion. Yet there is a certain odium which satire has dared to charge our English ladies with, which is, plastering the features with whitewash, or rubbing rouge or red upon their faces.
[_Gives the head off._] Women of the town may lay on red, because, like pirates, the dexterity of their profession consists in their engaging under false colours; but, for the delicate, the inculpable part of the s.e.x, to vermilion their faces, seems as if ladies would fish for lovers as men bait for mackerel, by hanging something red upon the hook; or that they imagined men to be of the bull or turkey-c.o.c.k kind, that would fly at any thing scarlet. [_Takes the head off._] But such pract.i.tioners should remember that their faces are the works of their Creator.--If bad, how dare they mend it? If good, why mend it? Are they ashamed of his work, and proud of their own? If any such there are, let 'em lay by the art, and blush not to appear that which he blushes not to have made them. If any lady should be offended with the lecturer's daring to take such liberties with her s.e.x, by {57}way of atonement for that part of my behaviour which may appear culpable, I humbly beg leave to offer a nostrum, or recipe, to preserve the ladies' faces in perpetual bloom, and defend beauty from all a.s.saults of time; and I dare venture to affirm, not all the paints, pomatums, or washes, can be of so much service to make the ladies look lovely as the application of this.
[_Shews the girdle of good temper._]
Let but the ladies wear this n.o.ble order, and they never will be angry with me; this is the grand secret of attraction; this is the Girdle op Venus, which Juno borrowed to make herself appear {58}lovely to her husband Jupiter, and what is here humbly recommended to all married folks of every denomination; and to them I appeal, whether husband or wife, wife or husband, do not alternately wish each other would wear this girdle? But here lies the mistake; while the husband _begs_ his wife, the wife _insists_ upon the husband's putting it on; in the contention the girdle drops down between them, and neither of them will condescend to stoop first to take it up. [_Lays down the girdle._]. Bear and forbear, give and forgive, are the four chariot-wheels that carry Love to Heaven: Peace, Lowliness, Fervency, and Taste, are the four radiant horses that draw it. Many people have been all their life-time making this chariot, without ever being able to put one wheel to it.
Their horses have most of them got the springhalt, and that is the reason why married people now a-days walk a-foot to the Elysian fields.
Many a couple, who live in splendor, think they keep the only carriage that can convey them to happiness; but their vehicle is too often the postcoach of ruin; the horses, that draw it are Vanity, Insolence, Luxury, and Credit; the footmen who ride behind it are Pride, l.u.s.t, Tyranny, and Oppression; the servants out of livery, that wait at table, {59}are Folly and Wantonness; them Sickness and Death take away. Were ladies once to see themselves in an ill temper, I question if ever again they would choose to appear in such a character.
Here is a Lady [_takes up the picture_] in her true tranquil state of mind, in that amiableness of disposition which makes foreigners declare that an English lady, when she chooses to be in temper, and chooses to be herself, is the most lovely figure in the universe; and on the reverse of this medallion is the same lady when she chooses _not_ to be in temper, and _not_ to be herself. [_Turns the picture._] This face is put on when she is disappointed of her masquerade habit, when she has lost a _sans prendre_, when her lap-dog's foot is trod {60}upon, or when her husband has dared to contradict her. Some married ladies may have great cause of complaint against their husbands' irregularities; but is this a face to make those husbands better? Surely no! It is only by such looks as these [_turns the picture_] they are to be won: and may the ladies hereafter only wear such looks, and may this never more be known [_turns the picture_] only as a picture taken out of aesop's Fables.
[_Gives off the picture._]
May each married lady preserve her good man, And young ones get good ones as fast as they can.
It is very remarkable there should be such a plentiful harvest of courts.h.i.+p before marriage, and generally such a famine afterwards.
Courts.h.i.+p is a fine bowling-green turf, all galloping round and sweet-hearting, a suns.h.i.+ne holiday in summer time: but when once through matrimony's turnpike, the weather becomes wintry, and some husbands are seized with a cold aguish fit, to which the faculty have given this name--[_Shews the girdle of indifference._] Courts.h.i.+p is matrimony's running footman, but seldom stays to see the stocking thrown; it is too often carried away by the two grand preservatives of matrimonial {61}friends.h.i.+p, delicacy and grat.i.tude. There is also another distemper very mortal to the honeymoon; 'tis what the ladies sometimes are seized with, and the college of physicians call it by this t.i.tle--[_Shews the girdle of the sullens._]
This distemper generally arises from some ill-conditioned speech, with which the lady has been hurt; who then, leaning on her elbow upon the arm-chair, her cheek resting upon the back of her hand, her eyes fixed earnestly upon the fire, her feet beating tattoo time: the husband in the mean while biting his lips, pulling down his ruffles, stamping about the room, and looking at his lady {62}like the devil: at last he abruptly demands of her her,
”What's the matter with you, madam?”
The lady mildly replies,
”Nothing.”
”What is it you mean, madam?”
”Nothing.”
”What would you make me, madam?”