Five rows of perriwigs, faithful portraits we dare be sworn every one, illustrate the Five Orders of Perriwigs. First in order we have the Episcopal, or Parsonic Wigs, followed by the Old Peerian or Aldermanic; the Lexonic; Composite, or Half Natural; and, last of all, the Queerinthian. The reader will understand from the advertisement given above that the engraving was a notable quiz on Athenian Stuart, as he was called, whose laborious and accurate work on the Antiquities of Athens has been of such service to architects. It is said that the portrait of Stuart, outlined as a wig-block in the original was so unmistakably like the author of the Antiquities that Hogarth struck off the nose on purpose to disguise the joke a little. One of the Old Peerian order of wigs was at once recognized as a hit at the notorious Bubb Doddington, “the last grave fop of the last age:”
“Who, quite a man of gingerbread,
Savour’d in talk, in dress, and phiz,
More of another world than this.”
Bubb Doddington’s wig is again figured by Hogarth in one of the prints of “The Election,” where it shares in the perils and triumphs of the chairing of the member. Cumberland says that when Doddington was made Lord Melcomb, he actually strutted before the looking-glass, coronet in hand, to study deportment. Warburton’s wig was another of the portrait-wigs, of the Parsonic order. From Hogarth’s most popular works alone one might select a gallery of wigs—tie-wigs, bag-wigs, pig-tails, and bob-wigs, in every variety—well worthy of earnest criticism. Matthews used to say he wondered what the beggars did with their left off clothes till he went to Ireland, when he discovered some of those old relics curiously clinging to the nakedness of their brethren of the Emerald Isle. What became of the old wigs we had ourselves never sufficiently considered till we scanned one of these said prints, and found, to our delight, what had evidently once been a wig comically seated on the head of a young vagrant beside a gutter.
Voltaire’s wig, in the eyes of his contemporaries, was as fatally charged with the electricity of criticism, as Dr. Johnson’s proved to be, to the terror of his obsequious followers. This Rhadamanthus of literature, speaking of Geneva, says, “Je secoue ma perruque, la republique est bien poudrée.” There was one, André, a perriwig maker, who wrote a play in 1760, and ventured to solicit Voltaire’s friendly criticism. His reply is well known; it filled four sides of a sheet of letter-paper with merely a repetition of “Monsieur André, faites des perruques,” and ending, “toujours des perruques et jamais que des perruques.” Descartes had a great passion for perukes; and at the taking of Dresden, Frederick the Great found in the wardrobe of Count Brühl some hundreds of wigs—one authority says fifteen hundred.
Some time before bag-wigs went out of fashion a practical joke was played off in Pall Mall, with the intention of bringing bags into contempt, which had like to have ended somewhat seriously. The particulars are given in the Annual Register of 1761. Some wags dressed up a porter in a bag-wig and lace ruffles, and made him as Frenchified as possible, and drove him into the midst of the fashionable throng in the Mall. His superb dress immediately won the admiration of the votaries of pleasure, who seemed anxious to make his acquaintance; but his absurd conduct soon convinced them of the trick which had been played upon them, and the fellow was thrust out from among them—we sincerely hope with the addition of a good cudgelling.
The time came when perriwig makers had fallen upon evil days. The fashion was evidently on the decline—something must be done for the common good; when, Curtius like, they took a bold leap. Accordingly, on the 11th February, 1765, they presented a petition to his majesty George III., the prayer of which was, that a law should be passed to enforce the wearing of wigs, and that his majesty should help to keep up the fashion. Alas! for the mutability of human affairs, it is questionable if the good king had the power to revive, even for an hour, an expiring fashion: it is certain in this instance, as in others of graver moment, he obstinately adhered to his own choice, and clung to his pig-tail in spite of remonstrance. The London mob, however, proceeded to legislate after their own fashion; and, observing that the wig makers, who wished to make others wear wigs, wore no wigs themselves, they seized hold of the petitioners by force, and cut off all their hair. “Should one wonder,” says Horace Walpole, “if carpenters were to remonstrate that since the peace there has been no call for wooden legs.” George III. might well be content with his modest pig-tail, which queen Charlotte, like a home-loving wife, as she was, often powdered and bound with ribbon, and curled his majesty’s hair in the style he preferred, well knowing in such matters none could please him so well as herself; and thus adorned, we are told, he read the speech from the throne at the meeting of parliament.
At the marriage of the Princess Royal to the Prince of Orange, in the reign of George II., the bridegroom wore a long curled perriwig to hide the terrible hump which disfigured his princely shoulders. As soon as the awkward ceremony was over, the queen gave vent to her feelings in a flood of tears.
The Maccaroni Club, 1772, set the fashion of wearing the hair in a most preposterous style. It was combed upwards into a conical-shaped toupée of monstrous size; and, behind the head, the hair was plaited and tied together into a solid bundle, which of itself must have been an inconvenient load for a gentleman’s shoulders. The ladies wore a head-dress of similar altitude, piling Peleon upon Ossa, in the shape of a cushion of horse hair and wool, over which the hair, pomatumed and powdered, was spread out and carried upwards towards the clouds, bedecked with lace and ribbon; the sides of this delectable mountain were ornamented with rows of curls: but words can convey but a very poor idea of this diverting monstrosity. “An you come to sea in a high wind,” says Ben to Mrs. Frail, in Congreve’s “Love for Love,” “you mayn’t carry so much sail o’ you head—top and top-gallant.” And the Macarronies in their day ran the same risk of being capsized by a squall. At the opera these head-dresses so completely intercepted all view of the stage to those in the rear, that, in 1778, a regulation was put in force which excluded them altogether from the amphitheatre.