The performer bends himself backwards, with his head turned up between his hands, so as nearly to touch his feet; and in this situation he hangs by his hams upon a pole, supported by two of his confederates.
The posture-master is frequently mentioned by the writers of the two last centuries; but his tricks are not particularised. The most extraordinary artist of this kind that ever existed, it is said was Joseph Clark, who, "though a well-made man, and rather gross than thin, exhibited in the most natural manner almost every species of deformity and dislocation; he could dislocate his vertebræ so as to render himself a shocking spectacle; he could also assume all the uncouth faces that he had seen at a Quaker's meeting, at the theatre, or any other public place." To this man a paper in the Guardian evidently alludes, wherein it is said: "I remember a very whimsical fellow, commonly known by the name of the posture-master, in Charles the Second's reign, who was the plague of all the tailors about town. He would send for one of them to take measure of him; but would so contrive it as to have a most immoderate rising in one of his shoulders; when his clothes were brought home and tried upon him, the deformity was removed into the other shoulder; upon which the taylor begged pardon for the mistake, and mended it as fast as he could; but, on another trial, found him as straight-shouldered a man as one would desire to see, but a little unfortunate in a hump back. In short, this wandering tumour puzzled all the workmen about town, who found it impossible to accommodate so changeable a customer." [749] He resided in Pall Mall, and died about the beginning of king William's reign. Granger tells us he was dead in the year 1697. [750] There was also a celebrated posture-master, by the name of Higgins, in the reign of queen Anne, who performed between the acts at the theatre royal in the Haymarket, and exhibited "many wonderful postures," as his own bill declares: [751] I know no farther of him. In the present day, the unnatural performances of the posture-masters are not fashionable, but seem to excite disgust rather than admiration in the public mind, and for this reason they are rarely exhibited.
XXVIII.—THE MOUNTEBANK.
I may here mention a stage-performer whose show is usually enlivened with mimicry, music, and tumbling; I mean the mountebank. It is uncertain at what period this vagrant dealer in physic made his appearance in England: it is clear, however, that he figured away with much success in this country during the two last centuries; he called to his assistance some of the performances practised by the jugglers; and the bourdour, or merry-andrew, seems to have been his inseparable companion: hence it is said in an old ballad, entitled Sundry Trades and Callings,
A mountebank without his fool
Is in a sorrowful case.
The mountebanks usually preface the vending of their medicines with pompous orations, in which they pay as little regard to truth as to propriety. Shakspeare speaks of these wandering empirics in very disrespectful terms:
As nimble jugglers that deceive the eye,
Disguised cheaters, prating mountebanks,
And many such like libertines of sin.