Weekly national intelligencer. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1841-1869, 1847-08-21
NATIONAL INTELLIGENCER.
NOTES ON NEW BOOKS.
Citations OH Of Foreign ReUie,cs continue


lest period till the close of the eighteenth century
nv r w. Fairholt, T. S. A.. London, lS46'') we
find embodied an illustration of the skill of one Of
the most confident of the Shakspearean CONNER
taors which Is quite amusing. Mr.. Fairholt says:
Shakspeares description in his King John, of the taller,
who eager acquant his friend the smith with the pfodges
the skies had just exhibited, and whom Hubert saw
90 Standing on slippers which his nimble haste
Had falsely thrust upon contrary feet,
is strictly accurate But half century ago this passage
adudged be of the many proofs of Shakspeares gno
rance carelessness Dr. Johnson himself of the
truth in this point and, like too many other critics. deter
mined to pass the verdict of sefeected and inforned
Judge makes himself supremacy ridiculous by saying, in
10 this passage, with udcrous soemny, Shakespeare
to have COMPOUNDED the mans shoes with his gloves He that
is ghted hurried may put his hand into the wrong
but either shoe will equally admit either foot The author
seems to disturbed by the disorder which he describes
This hand style of accusation and condemnation founded
on mistaken affinity between ages remote and distinct from
each other may be quite easily fallen into by the artist who
would alter the shape form of article of costume because
may clash with modern ideas of TASTE PERHAPS quite full
of unfounded prejudice the taste OF earlier me and
which may thus asy than improve his subject That
which tells most upon the eye in an ancient picture scup
tuc quaint peculiar bit Of costume and which may
occasionally be taken bad drawing is not unfrequeny the
accurate deneaon of a zeal PECULIARLY
By combining his early researches to the outward
man of South Britain Mr.. Fairholt has, no doubt,
avoided some serious difficulties. Since the antique
fashion of Scotland appears TO have been painted
skin, we should like 10 know how our historian of
clothes would have treated that sort of wearing APP
parel Rag Fair was hardly very fourishing then,
and perhaps the state of the old clothes trade rather
low. One would like to know, too, what the learn
ed annast has to say TO the celebrated coupet cited
in the Scrblerus papers as to the costume, on one
occasion, of an Anglo-Saxon monarch:
"a painted Prince Vortigern had on,
Which from a naked Pict his grandsire won."
1t appears from the Review that our antiquary of
slops next proceeds to handle the venerable matter
Of the beard 1t says:
There end the absurd vagarie of displayed
by our all parts of their personal adornment and
examples OF which faithfully chronced and carved in this
volume II is remarkable, also, in contemplating hem
find how folly itself exhausts its inventive in time
and TO the fashions of long departed age
Under the head Of Boards, instance, the ample CLOS
sary the latter part Of the volume presented with
goody specimens of musachio and beard by
worthless between the fourteenth and sixteenth centuries
Of which would excite spirit of emulation the chin of the
Prince de Joinvile himself"
Here, now, is reviewer to be ashamed Of one
TO be himself reviewed for the narrowness of his
Meas. 1t is some son of the strap, some shaver
tlrned critic, some eX-weaver OF wigs, who writes
thus irrevereny of that sacred part of the person,
the beard Did not those fine old-fashioned gentle
men, the Patrarchs, scorn all denudaton Of their
chins !! Can there be any doubt of Moses having
sported moustaches, or of Aarons having cherished
his whiskers!' Was not the letting himself be crop
ped the undoing of that strong man, Samson
What if Prince Absalom suffered for his redundant
locks That is only wig-maker's instance in
favor Of his own vile commodity, toupees and
scratches. Besides, Absalom should have kept his
hat on, or avoided running his headinto the bushes
We read in all the picture books that the Apostles
preserved, with the most Jealous self-respect the
brlsty honors of their Jaws; and who from Noah
down to Joe Smith, has pretended to think of being
prophet without hairy amplitude of evidence be-
meath his nose and ears!
If we turn to Pagan creeds, we find the mas
culine glory of the face held not less in reverence
When, in the outset of the Had, Thetis ascends TO
ask Of Jove a favor, in the most solemn form OF
suppcation, she falls at his feet, clasps with one
arm his knees, and as the most sacred manner OF
appeal, touches with the other hand his majestic
beard In like manner, when the Musselman would
the highest form of aduraton, he swears by the
hairs on the chin of Mahomed. The Seven Sages
of Greece, and the long line of her philosophers,
Socrates Plato, the mighty intellect OF Aristotle and
all the subsequent wisdom of her morasts cultivated
an ample beard the very designation of the pro.
found thinker In Rome, single fatal incident
marks what was there the dignity of this foliage Of
the countenance who that has read Goldsmith, as
improved by the condescension of Mr.. Grimshaw,
have forgotten how, at the taking of the city BY
Brennus, the Senate, knowing that all was lost
sembed in the customary temple, and sat with
flowing robes and sweeping boards, in profound ST.
lence awaiting their fate until at last some barba-
ran soldier, flushed with plumber, entered the hail.
and taking them, from their stiffness and their i'm
posing looks, for body of sculptured demi-gods,
fell at the feet OF the grandest looking old fellow Of
them all and s:roked his beard! Reused by the
indgnity, the Conscript Father lifted on high his
ivory sceptre and felled the profane Gaul to the
EARTH though at the certain consequence Of imme-
date massacre 10 himself and all his senatorian
brothers. Rome might perish; but boards must be
indicated
The fact which we have just mentioned sufficient
ly attests the Celtic admiration well as the Latin
pride in this manly ornament OF the visage. In the
Druldca religion, that powerful and artful priest
hood is well known TO have reserved to itself the
important privilege Of nourishing superior shay
giness Of excretion. Their Christian successors.
the Welsh bards retained it, down TO the time of
their general massacre by Edward |: witness Gray
description Of the wildlyaoating coma of the last OF
them
Loose his beard and hoary hair
Sueamed like meteor to the troubled air.
The ancient Germans appear from Tacitus, tc
have set due value upon the gift Of a beard-one
OF the comeiest parts Of the person, and surely one
Of the strongest marks of the superiority Of our
Caucasian race to all others. The Gymnosophists