For state and ceremony except among the lawyers and the bench of bishops, at last nothing worthy the name of a perriwig was left to admire. George the Third’s bag-wig was as unpretending as the king himself. His statue beyond Charing Cross will happily remind posterity of that most respectable monarch—and his wig. Dr. Johnson’s scratch-wig, of which Boswell has left us a most authentic account, is familiar to most readers. That famous old scratch, too small for his head, always uncombed, and the fore part burnt away by contact with the candle, must be carefully distinguished from the smart wig which Mrs. Thrale’s butler kept for him at Streatham and placed on his head as he passed through the hall to dinner.
During the decadence of the wig, the army and navy wore pig-tails, which were nourished with regulation charges of powder and pomatum. How gallantly they defended them, the history of many a well-fought battle can tell—
“Not once or twice in our rough island story,
The path of duty was the way to glory.”
In 1804, the soldier’s allowance of pig-tail was reduced to seven inches, and in 1808 the order was promulgated to cut them off, but countermanded the very next day. However, revocation was impossible; for the barbers, with their usual alacrity, had performed their stern duties successfully, and not a pig-tail remained to the British army.
Is the reader curious to know something about Sergeants of the coif, and the mysteries of the bar-wig with its rows of curls and twin tails? Let him make his studies from nature, and “the stiff-wigged living figures,” as Elia calls them. The sages of the law were among the last to forego the use of wigs in private life; and it is said that Mr. Justice Park acquired the cognomen of Bushy Park, from the peculiar fashion of his wig, which he retained long after his brethren of the long robe had forsaken theirs. In the Table-talk of Samuel Rogers there is an anecdote of Lord Ellenborough’s wig. The judge was setting out for the circuit, and as Lady Ellenborough wished to accompany him, it was agreed between husband and wife that no band-boxes of any kind would be tolerated; for, when travelling, his lordship had a great aversion to band-boxes. On the journey, however, as the judge was stretching his legs in the carriage, they came in contact with the thing he so cordially detested—a band-box. In an instant his lordship seized hold of it, and threw it out of the window. The carriage stopped, and the footman was about to pick it up, when his lordship called out, “Drive on!” Arrived at the county town, when the judge was putting on his robes before going into court, enquiry was made for the wig, which, at the last moment, was nowhere to be found. After much delay, the footman was interrogated by his lordship, “Where is my wig?” “Why, my lord,” replied the servant, “you threw it out of the window.” It seems that her ladyship’s maid, envious that a judge’s wig should travel so comfortably in its proper case, while some pieces of millinery were in danger of being terribly crushed for want of a larger box, at their last resting place had made an exchange, and put the fright of a wig in a band-box, and the millinery in the wig-box. The most villainous of the wig tribe was certainly the peruke of George the Fourth’s reign, which, pretending to imitate the natural hair, was, on that very account, the more detestable, in as much as an ape’s features are more ridiculous from bearing some resemblance to a man.
Even the bishops have gradually forsaken the episcopal wig. The Irish bishops do not appear to have worn them. The Honorable Richard Bagot, bishop of Bath and Wells, was the first of our modern bishops who dispensed with the wig. Many years previous to his obtaining the bishopric, the Prince Regent had said to him in a joke, “You are much too handsome a man to wear a wig; remember, whenever I make you a bishop you may dispense with wearing one.” However, when the bishop reminded his sovereign that his promise when Regent exempted him from wearing a wig, it was only after much hesitation that the favour was granted. Bishop Bloomfield officiated in an orthodox-peruke at the coronation of William IV.; and more recently in the House of Lords, at times, a solitary wig came forth like a decrepid fly in mid-winter, drowsily contemplating the change and bustle going on around it. For a brief space it walked the earth like a troubled spirit—the reverend fathers have exorcised it, and it is no more seen of men.
When George IV. was king, his were the model whiskers (though false ones) which constituted the standard of perfection. Our continental neighbours, in derision, frequently likened the English whiskers to mutton chops or a string of sausages; but John Bull who is always tolerant of abuse, and goes about matters after his own sturdy fashion, maintained his whiskers with imperturbable gravity. Moore, in one of his humorous poems, thus takes off the vanities of royalty, and it says much for the good sense of the king that he could enjoy the wit of the poet when directed against himself:
“He looks in the glass—but perfection is there,
Wig, whiskers, and chin-tufts all right to a hair;