The soul within the brain does dwell.
But I, who am not half so wise,
Think I have seen’t in Chloe’s eyes;
Down to her lips from thence it stole,
And there I kiss’d her very soul.
The kings and queens of England in ancient times practiced the ceremony of washing the feet of beggars, in imitation of Christ, who washed the feet of His disciples. They washed and kissed the feet of as many poor people as they themselves numbered in years, and bestowed a gift, or maunday, upon each; the ceremony occurred on Maundy-Thursday. Queen Elizabeth performed this ceremony when she was thirty-nine years old—that is, she kissed the feet of thirty-nine paupers after their feet had been washed by yeomen of the laundry with warm water and sweet herbs, and afterward by the sub-almoner. The last of the English monarchs who performed this office in person was James II., in 1731, in his forty-eighth year. In 1530, on Maundy-Thursday, Cardinal Wolsey washed and kissed the feet of fifty-nine poor men, “and, after he had wiped them, he gave every one of the said poor men twelve pence in money, three ells of good canvas to make them shirts, a pair of new shoes, a cask of red herrings and three white herrings, and, to one of them, two shillings.” This custom is no longer observed, but the poor still receive their gifts from the royal bounty.
V.
Different kinds of kisses: The long, long kiss, the paroxysmal, the icy, the Western, the life-teeming kiss—How college girls kiss—The kiss of a female cornetist—Platonic kisses—Roman osculation—Characteristics of kisses—The kiss as a punishment—The king of baby-kissers—The kiss after marriage—Stolen kisses, sometimes called “dainty bits of plunder”—The story of a Circassian girl.
There are a great many kinds of kisses. There is Byron’s “long, long kiss of youth and love.” A rural suitor kissed his girl repeatedly after this fashion. When he finally ceased, the tears came into her eyes, and she said, in sad tones: “Ah, Rufus! I fear you have ceased to love me!” “Oh, no, I haven’t,” he replied, with a wearied air, “but I must breathe!” The “paroxysmal kiss” has been described as a kiss “buttered with soul-lightning.” Very different from the kiss of a certain prominent actress:
Hail! kiss of Mary Anderson, all hail!