[7]. Niebuhr says, “I once saw, in a caravan, an Arab highly offended at a man who had accidentally bespattered his Beard. It was with difficulty he could be appeased, even though the offender humbly asked his pardon, and kissed his Beard in token of submission.” Though I avoided breaking the argument by its insertion under the account of the Jews, it may be interesting to state, that Moses, in Numbers, orders a man to be considered unclean for seven days, whose Beard has been defiled in this way: and that David could scarcely have devised a more efficient means to convince Achish of his madness, than the expedient he adopted of allowing his saliva to descend upon his Beard.
[8]. It used to be considered one of the almost impossible feats of Chivalry to pluck a hair from the Sultan’s Beard.—(May the Russians find it quite so!) The romance of Oberon is founded on this notion, and Shakspeare makes Benedict say in a spirit of bravado, “I’ll fetch you a hair off the great Cham’s Beard.” (i.e. Khan of Tartary’s Beard.)
[9]. The Rev. John More, of Norwich, a worthy clergyman in Elizabeth’s reign, who is said to have had the longest and largest Beard of any Englishman of his time, seems to have chosen this Spartan for his model; since when asked to give a reason for it he replied, “that no act of his life might be unworthy of the gravity of his appearance.” And Baudinus, quoted by Pagenstecher, says, Frederick Taubman, the celebrated German wit, humourist, and theologian, being asked the same question answered, “in order that whenever I behold these hairs, I may remember that I am no vile coward or old woman, but a man, called Frederick Taubman.”
[10]. That the Beard, however, sometimes afforded a handle to an enemy in ancient times, when swords, especially the Greek, were very short, is admitted. And I possess an engraving from one of Raphael’s Vatican Cartoons, where one soldier is represented in the act of cutting down another whom he has seized by the Beard. He must be a poor master of his weapon, however, who in modern times would allow a man to grasp his Beard without being hewn down or run through in the process.
[11]. Suetonius says, “he was excessively nice about his body, that he was not only sheered and shaved, but plucked.”
[12]. Besides shaving, the Romans as they progressed in luxurious effeminacy, used depilatories, tweezers and all sorts of contrivances to make themselves as little like men and as much like women as possible; and their satirists abound with passages impossible to quote with decency on the causes and consequences of this abrogation of the distinctive peculiarities of the two sexes.
[13]. Pagenstecher says, “one of the Emperors of Rome refused to admit to an audience certain Ambassadors of the Veneti, because they had no Beards.”
[14]. The branch of the Roman family to which Nero belonged was called Enobarbus, copper-coloured or red Beard; and the legend of the family was, that the Dioscuri announced to one of their ancestors a victory, and to confirm the truth of what was said, stroked his black hair and Beard, and turned them red. Cn. Domitius, who was Censor with L. Crassus the orator, “took” says Pagenstecher, “too much pride in his,” and Crassus fired away the following epigram upon it. “Quid mirum si barbam habet aeneam Domitius cum et os ferreum et cor habet plumbeum.” (Where’s the wonder Domitius has a brazen Beard, when he has bones of iron and a heart of lead.) Shakspeare (the unlearned!) who never loses a characteristic, makes his Enobarbus, (who was great grandfather of Nero, wore a Beard, as seen on his medals, and was a fine bold warrior,) speak thus of Antony, under the fascination of Cleopatra:—
Lep. “Good Enobarbus, ’Tis a worthy deed,
And shall become you well, to entreat your Captain