The News-Herald. [volume] (Hillsboro, Highland Co., Ohio) 1886-1973, 1914-01-22
FAMOUS SLOvENS
They Had a Fine Contempt For
Personal Appearance.
GENIUS IN UNC0UTH ATTIRE.
Turner. the Artist; Dressed Like an
Old Time Cab Driver-Dr. johnson
Was Grotesque, and "old Fitz" Out
ragged All the Ssrtorial Conventions.

Old Time Cab Driver-Dr. johnson
Was Grotesque, and ''Old Fitz" Out
ragged Al the Sartoriai Conventions
1t Is surprising how outrageously
careless of their personal appearance
many famous men have been. Genius
may or may not be allied to madness,
but IT has certainly very often been
linked with an utter disregard for
clothes and cleanly habits
1t is said of Turner. the great land.
scape painter. that his hands were the
smallest and dirtiest hands on record"
Perhaps that is an exaggeratiOn, but
he was certainly very slovenly In his
dress He wore black swallowtail
dress coat. very much In need Of
clothesbrush vigorously used. and In
the warmest AS well as in the coolest
weather he wore round his throat
sort of wrap or muller. which he
would unloose, letting the ends dangle
down in front and dip into the colors
of his palette. He always worked
either with his old hat on his head or
with this same large muller over his
head His appearance was more like
that Of an old time coachman than of
a famous Royal Academcian, for he
was short and stout, with a red and
blotchy face
DR.. Johnson's slovenliness has al
most passed into a proverb There are
many contemporary accounts of his
turning out of his house in Bolt court
with his wig back to front and his
stockings down. When Boswell visited
him at Inner Temple lane he records:
His brown suit of clothes looked very
rusty; be had on a little. old shriveled,
unpowdered wig, which was too small
for his head; his shirt neck and the
knees of his breeches were loose. his
black worsted stockings i'll drawn up,
and by way of slippers he had on a
pair of unbuckled Shoes" When 1t is
added that this great man was con-
stantly twitching, grunting, shaking
bis head, putting his cheeks and blink
ing his eyes, it must be admitted that
his appearance was not only uncouth
but grotesque
Thomas Carlyle, coming of a peasant
race, never conformed to society garb.
He was always the inspired peasant
He would sometimes 60 out in his
| old dressing gown, over which he but
toned big coat, gray with age When
he was left alone in the house he de-
lighted in swilling his iagstones with
pals of water, and many a distin-
guished friend found him thus en-
gagged with kind Of smock on and
| his bushy hair all tousled. He went
about all. the summer among the high
est aristocracy in a frieZe jacket which
was part of an old dressing gown. All
the cabmen and bus drivers Chelsea
way knew him One said, He may
wear queer at, but what would yer
give for the eadpiece inside Of it?"
1t would not be seemly to describe
| Tennyson as slovenly in any real
sense He was a singularly noble
looking man. but he did not care jot
what he wore. His. old slouch hat had
seen unnumbered years and aapped
| about at all angles, and the Inverness
| cape which he invariably wore was
about as old as his hat People who
met him without knowing his immense
distinction would have regarded him
as rather quaint character. and a
tailor's cutter would not have assessed
him at half a dollar. all told
This is a description of the daily ap-
| pearance of Edward Fitzgerald, the
immortal translator of ''The Rubaiyat"
of Omar Khayyam: "Straggling gray
hair and slovenly in dress, wearing an
ancient, battered black banded, shiny
edged tall hat. round which he would
in wintry weather tie handkerchief
to keep 1t in place; his clothes of
baggy blue cloth, as though he were a
seafarer; his trousers short and his
shoes low, exhibiting length of white
or gray stockings. With an unstarch'
I'd shirt front. high, crumpled, standup
collar, big black silk tie in a careless
! bow; In cold weather trailing a green
and black and gray plaid shawl, in hot
weather even walking barefoot with
his boots slung to a stick" Surely
'Old Fitz." as Tennyson called him,
took the cake for slovenliness of all
! the immortals!-P Pearson's Weekly.