Smyrna times., 1866-11-28
GOOD LOOKS.

Baptista Porta, who fills an honorable place
among the early physiognomists demonstrated
that, great as is the difference which subsists
between mankind and brutekind, the relation
ship between them is nearer than generally sus
pected, and that beauty is higher akin to the
beast than most people suppose. In most of
our species, especially in such of them as in
any way had rendered themselves conspicuous
among their fellowmen, he detected certain ia
cial characteristics which they possessed in COM
mon with the lower animals, tracing, for in
stance, a close resemblance between the linea-
ments of the divine Plato and the cOuntenance
of setter dog. Many human faces" (Bap-
tista Porta thought that almost alD "have a
striking resemblance to particular animals"
says Francis Grose, in his 6 Hogarth has given
some instances of these resemblances: one in
the Gate of Calais, where two old fshwomen
are pointing out their likeness to Aat-fsh !;
another in the portrait of the Russian Her
cUles, where, under the figure Of bear, he
has preserved the lineaments of his poetical
antagonist" Charles Churchill. LIE Brun,
the painter, adopted Baptista Portals physi-
ognomical doctrine, and gave it practical ex-
preston by preparing a series OF studies OF hu-
man heads, with their corresponding types OF
the bestial creation, and from comparison of
the two, he believed general law could be de-
duced, whereby it would be possible to deter
mine, at sight, the disposition and tempera-
ment both of the man and his representatives
among the brutes. Were either of them timid
or audacious, savage or placable, he thought it
could be ascertained without difficulty at a
glance. He considered the token of courage
TO be the little protuberance over the nose in
proportion to its size, small or great, was the
animal daring Or fearful. All great men, and
all great animals, he believed to be eminent in
the matter of nose-the eagle and Julius Cae-
sar, to wit; and fine swelling proboscis was,
in his mind, the invariable accompaniment OF
elevation of thought and grandeur of concep-
ton, and thus did both Aristotle and Baptista
POrta also think of the straight nose, blunt at
its termination, towcr-shaped," as Sir Thom-
as Browne phrases it. Noses, we know, are
of all varieties; Grose divides them into the
angular, the aquiline or Roman, the parrot s
beak, the straight or Grecian, the bulbous or
bottled, the turned-up or snub, and the mixed
or broken; each of which supply the indication
of its owner g character, as, by some persons,
the chin is supposed to do. But the better
opinion is that the chin affords far less relia-
BILE index to character than the nose, being less
marked and less numerous in its varetles.-
Indeed, with the exception of the double, the
nut.cracker, and the cucumber chin, there is
nOLnlng specially TeuaTKaDle III ltS IedLuTe Vi
the face Far otherwise with the nose, oi
which Napoleon Bonaparte was accustomed to
say that he generally found long nose, such
as that we have been mentioning, associated
with long head-an admission the more sin
gular as his own nasal development was q
striking contradiction to his rule When LIZ
Brun propOunded the theory, of which he was
rather the expcsitor than the author, the in
uuirv grew current in Parisian sOciety-Wh
is your beast2 Flatterers said there could b.
no doubt, especially having regard to the nose
judged by lie Brun standard, that the Prince
de Conde had tor his congener nose a beast Of
the very first rank, at once strong, fierce, gen
tie, placable, terrible in power, but, withal
full of amenity, courtesy, and graciousness. =
Mirabeau, on the other hand, with his impli
tude of hair, his expansive and expressive coun
tenance, to which the small nose had lent
singular appearance, his massive jaws and shag
gy eyebrows, all suggestive of both Power anC
Will, what inferior (if inferior) animal coulC
he recall to the mind but the lion of terrible
paw and deep-depcnding name?