Wessington Springs herald. (Wessington Springs, Aurora County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1883-1891, 1890-02-14
HIVE you DOUBLE CHIN?

If So, BE Proud of 1T, as It Indicates
strong Characteristic Don't TaM mit.
II Too Much.
The great ustitication of the double
chin rests, of course, on its u%nrivalled
value as an index of character-and
such a character! 1t is really natures
patent with nobility. This was long
ago discerned by the great master of
physiognomy. 1t is not difficult to
divine what Lavater thought Of a
double chin. He carefully points out
that man differs from the animals
chiefly by his chin, laying it down as
an axiom that the chin is the distinctive
characteristic Of humanity: conse-
quently double chinned people are
doubly diferential from the beasts that
perish, which is greatly to their credit.
He expressly takes for his model OF
"the thinker, full of sagacity and pene-
tration," a MAI with a fieshy double
chin, coupled with a nose rounded at
the end. The portrait he gives is even
better than the letter press, as the gen
tleman is limned with at least five
chins, so that his lower jaw was a vista
of magnificent distances, like Washing
ton. This happy p~hysiognomy of the
double chin, coupled with the rounded
nose, characterizes, he tells us, the
mind which can rise to heights, and
which follows it's designs with rejecting
firmness, unalloyed by obstinacy. Let,
therefore, those with double chins re-
joice, whether they possess rounded
noses OF not, and quote Lavater in graf
itude. He gives again another example
of the double mention, and the face so
endowed, he says, enthusiastically, is
reasons own image. He quite revels in
this feature. He takes an example of
Raphael, with q beautifully rounded
double chin; and, in criticising it, he
acknowledges that the profile is want
ing in truth. harmony and grace; but,
takes captive Il sympathy? Where
lies the illusion? Merely in the chin,
then, asks he, how is it that it so strongly
he answers; and as the chin is a double
one the matter is no longer a mystery.
He points triumphantly to Cicero's
magnificent double chin, and in a burst
OF eloquence says Of Wren's that, if you
can find q nan with (among other
things) such a chin as that, without be-
ing gifted with some extraordinary
talent, he renounces forever the science
OF physiognomy. What Lavater has
thus laid down experience amply cor
r%oborates. The double chinned, there
fore, should hold their heads up higher,
in the consciousness of modest merit,
and give free play and just prominence
to their certificates Of character. 1t is,
as limited above, rather difficult at pres
ent to tell who is endowed and who is
not. Portrait painters are craven
enough to dissimulate a double chin:
they leave it to a caricaturist, who
to think it great fun for a popular
statesman Or poet to have two chins,
whereas those ap%pendages are the secret
of their success. Some Of on1' more
observant writer's have got a glimpse Of
the truth. Wilkie Collins, for instance.
He very properly credits Count Fosco,
the man Of daring, and deter
minatlon, with a double chin, to which
Fasco's pet cockatoo calls public atten-
ton by rubbing it's head against it in
the most appreciable manner possible.
But your ordinary novelist would never
have thought Of that. As an English
man, by the way, one naturally turns
to Shakespeare to see wither his appear
c~orroborates Lavater's views.
Shakespeare undoubtedly foresaw the
point, as he foresaw everything else,
but he was sufficiently artful to wear
just enough beard to place it in eternal
doubt whether he had a double chin or
not. Thus he leaves it open to all par
ties, single chinned or double, to quote
him as an instance Of anything they
like, which, after all, is the great use
which Shakespeare has always been put
to.-Lo110on STANDARD.