In more modern days, we have had the gods and goddesses assumed by mortal men; but then it has been to amuse, and not to awe the multitude. They were often introduced in the mediæval shows when Burgundy exulted in her Dukes. I may cite, as an instance, the solemnity of the first entry into Lille of Charles the Bold, in his character of Duke of Burgundy. The delicate citizens got up a “mystery” whereby to do honour to the refined prince, which excited great amusement. It was “The Judgement of Paris.” To represent Venus, a tall and enormous woman had been selected, who weighed some twenty stone; Juno was as tall as Venus, but she was withered and lean; Minerva bore a hump both before and behind; while all three goddesses were naked, only wearing rich crowns upon their heads. Charles the Bold must have been as much pleased with pastime like this, as Dr. Pusey would doubtless be were he, in company with Father Newman, to take advantage of an order for two, and go and see Mr. Paul Bedford in the part of Norma.
Mark Antony was, despite his habit of getting drunk by daylight, so careful a dresser that he may be ranked among the beaux. Indeed he was specially fantastic in some of his fashions; and, by way of proof that he was the very “first fine gentleman” of his day, it is only necessary to cite what Textor says of him in the preface to the ‘Cornucopia,’ namely, “M. Antonius, Triumvir, corporis excrementa non nisi vasis aureis excipiebat.”
The Scandinavian beaux were as fantastically nice in some of their fashions. Rough as they were, there were many who wasted some amount of thought on the adornment of their persons. Such an individual was the pride of his relatives, and by these he was called, not the flower, but the leek of the family: he generally smelt a good deal stronger. Of such a dandy, his kindred were as proud as the “blood” of Caffarelli was of that smartly-dressed singer. But Caffarelli was a vocal beau who sang to some tune. He lived in a palace of his own building. Over the gate was this inscription:—“Amphion Thebas, ego domum;” and he purchased for his nephew and heir the Dukedom of Sante Dorato. That was a well-dressed uncle, of whom his nephew might well be—what he was not, of course—gratefully proud. Scandinavia reminds me of the great Gustavus Adolphus. He was not indeed himself a beau, but he was the first who made modern soldiers such. It was a consequence of his insisting on the necessity of the men being well clothed, and kept clean and warm. Except among Pompey’s cohort, this was not the custom of the ancients, with whom prevailed the maxim, “horridum militem esse decet.” So too thought Tilly, whose doctrine on the matter was comprised in the phrase, “A ragged soldier and a bright musket.” Some of Gustavus’s officers became the tightest-laced “exquisites” of suffering humanity, and reduced their outward surface to such a degree, that, had they lived in remoter times, they might have passed for those unhappy persons who had entered the temple of Jupiter in Arcadia, despite prohibition. The well-known consequence of such an act was, that the offender became for ever shadowless.
There is a race of men, not at all thin, and as rich dressers as Gustavus’s captains; I mean the Cardinals. There is a reason for their wearing red garments. Persons of early Church days used to draw Christian zodiacs and solar systems. In the former, the saints took the place of the old signs. In the latter, the planets were allotted to different religions. The sun belongs to Christianity; ergo, Sunday is the sabbath. Rome is the solar, and therefore the holy city; and accordingly the Cardinals wear red, because it is the colour of the sun.
To revert once more to the pupil of Aristotle, there remains but to be said that it was only on state occasions that he appeared in the mantle, sandals, and horns of Ammon. His ordinary dress was a chlamys of purple, a striped tunic (white on a coloured ground), and a wide-flapped hat or cap, with the royal diadem girt around it. He was in fact King of Fashion as well as King of Men; and, like Count D’Orsay, he not only patronized tailors, but, unlike the Count, paid their bills. The two men, in all other respects, were very different; and it cannot be said of them, as of Mr. Hunt’s ‘Light of the World,’ and his fast man in the ‘Awakened Conscience,’ that they are one and the same person in two costumes.
The Greeks generally were remarkable for possessing tailors who worked more according to the locality of their birth than to their merits; thus, Xenophon tells us, in his Life of Socrates, that Demeas, being a Collytensean, supported his household by making cassocks; while Menon, whose birthplace is not given, effected the same object by making cloaks. The custom however is more clearly defined when he adds that the Megarensians supported their families by making short jackets. Aristophanes, in his ‘Acharnians,’ alludes to this fashion when he makes the jovial Dicaopolis say, “Certain rascally fellows, base coin, unfranchised, and counterfeit, and alien citizens, were in the habit of informing against the small cloaks of the Megarians.” Between “cloak” and “jacket,” we may conclude that the article was a vest, or an “almaviva,” or mantle, and that it was no more lawful to wear it in Athens when the state was at war with Megara than it was in accordance with our “customs” a century ago to wear garments embroidered with gold-lace from France. This barbarous habit of denouncing the employment of an article, simply because it is the production of, or named from, an enemy, is still prevalent in the dominions of the Czar. If the thing be used, the name must be changed. Were we to follow the same fashion, no Englishman would condescend to put on a pair of “Russia ducks.”
But I have fallen into modern illustrations of the beau. When that superb animal is being treated of by Dryden, the poet names the various characteristics of divers beaux, from whom Sir Fopling Flutter had derived his own united excellences, which made of him the recognized “Man of Mode.” These are among them:—
“His various modes from various fathers follow:
One taught the toss, and one the new French wallow;
His sword-knot, this; his cravat, this design’d;