The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1871-02-24
THE REBH9.

The London Auen9uTe reviews as follows
a work entitled ''Bssai Historique ct Biblio-
graphic sur les Rebus, by Octave Delepierre,
which has Just been published in London by
Trubner & Coz
Although Picardy has the honor of being
considered the birthplace of the Rebus, the
thing itself, but without q name, was prac-
tised by the earliest, rudest people, who
conveyed by material figures to the eye
what they could not convey TO the thought
by words. The "serpent" has been a rebus
from the days that young Time counted his
birthdays by the sun. The same mode OF con-
veying Information has been adopted within
living memory by governors in distant settle-
ments, who, by significant figures, have intelli-
gibly proclaimed that whites and blacks might
live on friendly terms; that If one murdered
the other, that one would certainly be hanged;
and that general peace and plenty were better
than the gibbet. The old Aztec Generals
painted their dispatches, and the whole ad-
vance of Cortez on Mexico was explained to
the Oacique or Emperor in pictures. In China
and in Egypt the rebus was largely used for
hieroglyphics are but REFUSES under finer
name. In England facetious ecclesiastical
architects chronicled the doings and charac-
ters of church dignitaries in many group
on the capitals of columns and tracery-
work of cathedral arches. Menage states
that it is the name-Iebus-which first
came from Picardy. Certain younger menu
bers of the law used to amuse themselves and
the people of Amiens, in the Carnival season,
by reciting in public comic narratives and
facetious satires, with equivocal expressions
figured in a sort of hieroglyphic diagrams;
and these we're called "De re6us que gerU1o-
tar, " which may be taken for "The news of
the day." In these matters all the facts and
topics of the day were discussed, and figured
in the freest way that covert satire could find.
A taste for the thing spread into most house,
holds of the land. ]. was applied to the best
and basest purposes. just as flowers are the
''rebus" by which sentiment finds utterance,
so by figured images alone lovers wrote SON.
nets to their mistresses. People of impure
tastes used them to express what could not
be given in words Other persons employed
the rebus for mere amusement and the
puzzling of their fellows. Camden tells
us all that is known about the importation of
the rebus from France into England. We
learn from him that our English forefathers
who followed Edward the Third in his VIC
torious progress through France fell into the
humor as they found it. over the Channel.
The rebus came over the Straits from Calais
full sail, and was 50 entertained here by all
| degrees, by the learned and the unlearned,
that there was nobody who could not hammer
ont of his name an invention by this wit-craft,
and picture it accordingly. Whereupon,
who did not busy his brains
to hammer his device out of this
forgep" Like Mr.. Newberry, who to
represent his name hung up shield at his
door, on which was painted yew-tree with
several berries, with golden N in the middle,
all of which was the rebus for N-ew-berry.
Camden also tells of the ingenuity of lover
who loved certain Rosa Hill. He wore en-
broidered on his coat a rose, hill, an eye, a
loaf, and well, which signified "Rosa Hill l
to0e WELL" M. Delepierre may be referred to
the quaint old writer, Peacham, who, writing
in the time of James the First, pleasantly
alludes to armorial bearings in painted
glass windows, and the painted or carved
rabuses under which persons chose to signify
their names. He cites, among other examples
of bad taste to be seen painted in gentlemen's
halls, parlors, or books, the rebus of Master
Lugge, nightingale in bush, with scroll
in her mouth on which was written, in iraita-
tion of the birds note, 'lugge lugge!" One
Master Foxcraft had painted in his rooms a
fox feignirg to be dead, as he lay upon the
ice, amid a company of unsuspecting ducks
and goslings. Peacham mercifully suppresses
the name of churchwarden of ST. Martin in
the Fields, who caused to be engraved on the
church communion cup martin sitting upon
mole hill Between two trees, to indicate the
name of the parish. ''It is,' says Peacham,
there yet to be seen upon the communion
cup"
M. Delepierre admits into the family oi
Rebus such sound for sense as the following
&c A. @. o. B. l. A. l.. N, which reads
"Jai assez obei a Helene" He has over
looked one of the cleverest of these laborious
trifes, the lines on the death of the famous
Maurice, Marechal de SAKE, at the age Of
fifty-ive years. In these lines each last sylla
BILE has the sound of a number, and the tota
of the numbers amounts to ffty-fve. 1t il
only to be regretted that the lines are, for the
most part, more ingenious than decent. The
French are clever at such things. In 1915
the following (Which is not in M. Delepierrei
book served to convey censure on the Gov
ernment. 1t professed to portray the condi
ton of France in that year.
LIE peuple Francois est st...............D. X. d
Les places fortes sont........".......O. @. p
Quarantre-trois DEPARTMENTS. @. d
| LIE Rol est s..........,.......,...... M. E
| Les Ministries sont.............,.......... A.
Les faTls. ......................E IL. Is. Il
Les deputies. ID. L
La Dette Nationale.... o. @
LIE Credlt..... .............................. Is.
La Liberte de la Presse. 0. L
La Chafte... ........................:...L u. IL
NJ Delepierre dates the decline of the rebu
in England from the time that tavern sign
adopted the device. This is perhaps ques