The old story—Jews, Cogots, serfs, negroes—the outwitting, persecuting, and swindling some outlawed class of poor helpless victims, who have been made worse than they should be by oppression. This anecdote—like that of the free lance Conrad—is a sad epitome of the middle ages, and to us of the present day, it rings like a curse on the olden time, in the form of a diabolical jest. It is, however, bitterest of all, to find the oppressed—as in the stories illustrating mere feudal fidelity,—so utterly degraded as to actually take part with their oppressors and with the foes of humanity, against their own rights. So, in this present struggle with that incarnation of evil, and of the old devilish feudal oppression, the Confederate South, we are still pained to find among its adherents men, who, having been socially trampled on in Europe, seek, by sheer force of slavish habit, masters to lord it over them here. There is but one type of man who is more pitiable—it is he who is recreant to the great cause of freedom for the sake of—money!
A brutal and disgraceful jest-story, which stands in close relation to this last, is that of Detrimentum barbæ propter Sanctos;' or, 'losing a beard for the saints,' which runs as follows:
'A Hebrew contending with a Catholic, affirmed there were more Jewish saints in Heaven than Christian. It was thereupon agreed that each should name his saints in turn, and as he named, pluck a hair from the beard of his adversary.
'Abraham,' said the Jew, and plucked a hair.
'Saint Peter,' said the Christian.
'Isaac.'
'Saint Paul.'
And so they kept up their litanies, until the 'Christian,' exclaiming: 'Saint Ursula and the Eleven Thousand Virgins!' tore out the whole beard of the Jew by the roots, to the great laughter of all standing around.'
It would matter but little, that a fanatical and brutal crowd of the middle ages had laughed at seeing 'only a Jew' disgraced and dripping with blood, to point a scurvy jest. But, I confess that it struck me as singular, when I once found this story in a memoir, set down as having been narrated by an eminent Christian philosopher (now not long dead), as a capital thing. Granting its humor, is it worth while to inquire if he would have enjoyed it as much, had the Jew torn out the beard of the Christian in the name of the thousands who had been martyred for the faith of Israel?
The jokes of the middle ages on the subject of the beard, were numerous—it was a favorite ornament, as we may judge from the fact that Eberhard, the far-famed old warlike duke, sung in more than one poem by Uhland, is always spoken of in the old stories, as noster princeps barbatus, 'our bearded prince,' or, more familiarly, simply as 'our bearded one.' One of the table problems of the day was, 'Potestnè probari mulierem quandam habuisse barbam?'—'Can it be proved that any woman ever had a beard?' The answer to which, was, 'Yes—when Judith bore the head of Holofernes.' It was singular that such a question could have been agitated, when the legends of the saints contained the story of the bearded saintess of the Tyrol—a converted ballet-dancer, who was thus rendered hideous in accordance with her prayer, that she might be made so repulsive as to frighten away all lovers. And yet Mr. Barnum's Bearded Lady had a husband!