Part 22

This description of Female dress altered by _degrees_ to the present fashion: the Head insensibly lowered; the horse-hair gave place to large natural curls spread over the face and ears; the Cap enlarged to an enormous size, and the Bonnet swelled in proportion; Hoops were entirely discontinued, except at Court; silks became unfashionable, and printed calicoes and the finest white muslins were substituted, and still hold their influence. The Ladies have at length, much to their honour, thrown aside those hateful attempts to supply Nature's deficiencies or omissions, the false breasts, pads, and bottoms; and now appear in that native grace and proportion which distinguishes an English-woman: the Hair, cleansed from all extraneous matter, shines in beautiful lustre carelessly turned round the head in the manner adopted by the most eminent Grecian sculptors; and the Form appears through their snow-white draperies in that fascinating manner which excludes the least thought of impropriety. Their Hats and Bonnets of straw, chip, and beaver, are generally well-proportioned and handsome; and their velvet Pelisses, Shawls, and silk Spencers, are contrived to improve rather than injure the form.

But in the midst of this praise I must be permitted to make one observation; and that is, some thoughtless females indulge in the licence of freedom rather too far, and shew their persons in a manner offensive to modesty.

The Male dress changed almost insensibly from formality to ease. This was effected merely by altering the cut of the clothes: the materials are the same they were an hundred years past; the colours however are more grave. Deep blue, dark browns, mixtures, and black, are worn by the sedate and the gay, the young and the old: the former indeed sometimes appear in Coats _rather large_ for their persons; but they compensate for this oddity by stretching their Pantaloons almost to bursting, and wear something _that resembles_ the Waistcoat of a boy seven years old. The modern Hat is very convenient--a high flat crown and narrow brim, pressed down before and behind, and turned up at the sides. Square-toed Shoes have been revived; and half and whole Boots are, I believe, every thing but slept in. The modern Neckcloth should not be omitted, especially as it has undergone more ridicule than the rest of the dress in the aggregate; it is enough to say, the Neckcloth has been compared _to a towel tied under the chin_.

The Hair was a long time dressed or frizzed high on the head, like a negro's wool, and perfectly whitened with powder, and alternately plaited and turned up or queued behind. The Powder-tax occurred, and thousands of heads became in an instant black and brown; and, as the Revolution in France _deserved_ imitation, the fierce Republican head of Brutus stared us full in the front, mounted upon the shoulders of _Ladies_ and Box-lobby Loungers composed of puppies rather than men.

Since those days of horror Powder again makes its appearance with the hair cropped close, except above the forehead; there it is turned erect, in imitation of a--cock's-comb.

And now, Fashion, I bid thee, in perfect good humour, heartily farewell!

FOOTNOTES:

[323:A] The Bishop of Durham, within his Diocese, has many of the privileges of a Lay Peer; and Dr. Talbot had then lately succeeded to that See.

[338:A] See London Chronicle, vol. XI. p. 167, for 1762.

[353:A] London Chronicle, Feb. 14, 1763.

CHAP. IX.

DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURE TRACED FROM ITS ORIGIN TO ITS PRESENT IMPROVED STATE IN LONDON--LIGHTING AND IMPROVING OF STREETS--OBSTRUCTIONS IN THEM--ORNAMENTS, &C. &C.

The annual movement of the Sun to the South renders it an indisputable fact, that the Northern climate of England must have made huts or caves indispensibly necessary to the inhabitants, at least five months of each twelve, from the hour that our country was peopled. _Ideas_ are useless on such a subject; _sensation_ is sufficient; and instinct, which compels a brute to seek shelter under ground, or in a hollow tree, from the inclemency of the season, cannot have been so far denied to the Briton as to lead him to other expedients less calculated to answer his purpose. I do not hesitate, therefore, to assert that our Aborigines fortified existence in caverns natural and artificial, and in huts constructed of branches easily separated from trees, and covered or thatched with leaves and dried plants; nay, the piling of flat stones on each other seems an operation so easy and natural, that I cannot conceive why the art should have been imported; indeed, mortar is suggested by wet earth or mud dried on river sides by the air; and who knows but that our mud walls and even mud villages now to be found in numbers North of London may be the traditionary houses of our remotest ancestors[359:A]?

After this Island was invaded, the habitations of the various nations which accomplished the invasions were introduced by imitation, and copies of Roman, Saxon, Danish, and Norman houses were doubtlessly common. The Tesselated Pavements and Baths still discovered belong to the first; but their form can only be supposed, I should imagine, from the discoveries at Herculaneum.

The Saxons have left us strong and almost eternal proofs of their skill in masonry; but I believe there is little or nothing to be found, the work of their hands, besides Ecclesiastical Buildings and Castles. It is true, the latter were _habitations_, but for the rich and powerful alone; the dwellings of the mass of the community were too frail to reach our days.

The Danes appear to have done little more than plunder and destroy. The Normans, more politic, imitated the Saxons, and left us Churches and Castellated Mansions; but still we are without domestic architecture. All these facts tend to prove, that our Cities, and even London, consisted almost wholly of wooden or framed houses plastered. Why it was so, is a problem not easily resolved; for, supposing the antient Briton ignorant of masonry before the country was invaded, the Romans immediately introduced the cutting and sculpturing of stone, such cement as we cannot now equal, and the use of bricks. Perhaps, however, the uncertain tenure of all property discouraged the Farmer and Citizen from erecting solid mansions; indeed, they were all soldiers and vassals, and their houses probably were erected by their various masters at the least possible expence. This argument may apply to the time anterior to the Norman invasion; but it will not do after London increased, and the people were made more independent. When property became secure, the houses were certainly slight and combustible; and hence the tremendous fires which have been recorded between the time of William the Conqueror and 1666.

Stone was, I presume, almost exclusively used for Palaces and the mansions of the richest Citizens; but that is readily accounted for: Stone requires no great deal of preparation; the facing received the labours of the Sculptor or Mason, but the monstrous thick wall was filled with fragments from the chissel, or rough pebbles. Besides, pillars, mouldings, and fret-work, arose without difficulty from soft stone. Could those embellishments have been produced in brick without infinite trouble? and, would they ever have looked well when joined with mortar? Is it not then plain that the noble ideas of our Princes, Nobles, and other rich men who lavished vast sums on their structures, required _Stone_ to embody them; and that, had it been common, Brick would certainly have been rejected by them? The total disuse of brick by the rich deprived the less fortunate Citizen of its advantages. The revival or introduction of any manufacture demands encouragement from the powerful; if that is withheld, who will attempt them merely on disinterested motives? Parsimony in the great revived the art of Brick-making. When a Prince found the price of labour increase, and wished to build, he first stripped the design of his architect of ornament: thus stripped, a plain surface might be composed of any hard substance; Brick naturally occurred, and bricks were made. Still the mass of the people had them not. The affluent used them both in London and in the country; but the unhappy publick, fascinated with their Wood and Plaster, at last saw one fatal flame destroy all their frail tenements at one blow. The year 1666 expelled wooden buildings from our Metropolis; and from that year Brick reigned with undiminished sway, has crept beyond all reasonable limits, and even aspired to compose Churches and Chapels.

The next object in this difficult article will be the attempt to trace different æras in Domestic Architecture. Unfortunately the fire alluded to has nearly deprived us of a possibility of so doing in London: the most antient specimen there I should suppose to be the _ecclesiastical_ lodgings appendant to Westminster Abbey in Dean's-yard. I confess, they are not strictly in point; but I have ventured to mention them, as probably somewhat resembling those of the laity. Their date is previous to 1386, as Abbot Litlington, who built them, died in that year. It will be found that the windows are small and pointed: in this particular they differ from those erected at the same period by Richard II. adjoining the West side of Westminster-hall. Litlington's lodgings are of stone; but the latter is of brick, and perhaps one of the oldest specimens of that material in England, and certainly so in London. Part of it was recently taken down to widen the street, but enough remains to convince us œconomy prevailed in a very considerable degree at the date of its erection. From the time of Richard II. to that of Henry VIII. brick edifices were erected at intervals. In the reign of Henry VII. the pointed style became so expensive, through the introduction of excessive ornament, that its declination might readily be foreseen: accordingly the rich had recourse to brick; and when Henry VIII. dissolved religious houses, the pious had no motive to continue the use of splendid architecture in erecting or supporting Churches and Abbeys.

But I would not be understood to mean that the mansions of men of fortune were uniformly built of brick after Richard II. had introduced the use of it in London: there is at least one proof to the contrary now remaining, in the house of Sir John Crosby, erected soon after 1466. The reader, on referring to a view of that magnificent building inserted in the third volume of "Londinium Redivivum," p. 565, will find Sir John to have excelled the Monarch in his ideas of grandeur; and perceive, besides, that pointed windows with rich mullions were by no means confined to churches and ecclesiastical lodgings; and the roof will convince him that pendents pierced and flattened arches were not first introduced in the reign of Henry VIII.

The old gateway of St. James's Palace is a good specimen of brick architecture of that reign. Somerset-house, built in the reign of Edward VI. was an awkward imitation of the Grecian style; and the intercolumniations in several instances were filled with appropriate niches: but the remainder of those of the front had the old English angular window, with mullions of the same figure; the wings were more correct; that part of the Palace which faced the Thames resembled the style of St. James's before Inigo Jones altered it[364:A].

If we may credit the date, there is one house in Bishopsgate-street, almost adjoining St. Botolph's church, coæval with Sir John Crosby's, which resembles many others known to have been built in far subsequent periods. Whether the house alluded to of framed wood and plaster is really of the age mentioned is of little importance; but I think it may be safely adduced as a probable type of the mansions of tradesmen of very remote days.

Anderson says, in his History of Commerce, that most of the houses in London were thatched with straw in 1246; and that chimneys were not known to the inhabitants of the wooden houses even in 1300. According to this gentleman, they sat round stoves in the midst of smoke, which I suppose he intends to infer escaped through the doors and windows. The assertion that chimneys were _not known_ at that period is confuted by every old Castle in the kingdom. How the poorest classes fared in this particular, is another consideration.

There were numbers of private mansions erected in the reigns of Edward, Mary, Elizabeth, and James I.; most of which were of brick with stone quoins, ornaments, and window frames; for instance, Holland and Camden houses, Wyer-hall, the Middle Temple-hall, &c. &c. The windows of those were almost invariably angular and mullioned, and the ornaments resembled the Grecian rather than any other style. The reign of Charles I. was too unfavourable for general safety to admit the erection of many houses; but Inigo Jones appears to have improved the British imitation of the Grecian style almost to perfection. This architect, by elevating his cielings and altering the shape of windows, removed that darkness and gloom which belonged to the preceding æra.

Sir Christopher Wren completed the work commenced by Jones, and established the present favourite fashion of building; the gradations of which from splendour to extreme plainness are faithfully delineated in the prints which accompany this Volume. The examiner of those will find that our nobility and other rich persons can accommodate themselves to a house calculated for a man worth less than 200_l. per annum_, or occupy others of five times the dimensions.

We will now return to the more humble classes, and begin with some of the instances spared us by the fire of 1666. To describe those would be useless; prints are superior to the best description: the reader will have the goodness to consult them, and he will find old streets with the _projecting_ houses, and single old houses, and one or two sketches from the country to shew the Citizens' place of retirement[366:A].

Sir William Davenant drew a ludicrous yet true picture of antient London, which follows, and may be perused with double interest after a survey of the above old streets and houses, and their improved successors.

"You of this noble City are yet to become more noble by your candour to the plea between me a _Bourgeois_ of Paris, and my opponent of London; being concerned in honour to lend your attention as favourably to a stranger as to your native orator, since it is the greatest sign of narrow education to permit the borders of rivers, or strands of seas, to separate the general consanguinity of Mankind, though the unquiet nature of Man (still hoping to shake off distant power), and the incapacity of any one to sway universal empire, hath made them the bounds to divide government. But already I think it necessary to cease persuading you, who will ever deserve to be my judges; and, therefore, mean to apply myself in admonishing him who is pleased to be awhile my adversary.

"My most opinionated antagonist (for a Londoner's opinion of himself is no less noted than his opinion of his Beef before the Veal of Italy), you should know that the merit of Cities consists not in their fair and fruitful situation, but in the manners of the Inhabitants; for, where the situation excels, it but upbraids their minds if they be not proportionable to it. And, because we should more except against the constancy of minds than their mutability, when they incline to error, I will first take a survey of yours in the long-continued deformity of the _shape_ of your City, which is of your buildings.

"Sure your ancestors contrived your narrow streets in the days of wheel-barrows, before those greater engines _Carts_ were invented. Is your climate so _hot_, that as you walk you need umbrellas of tiles to intercept the Sun? Or, are your shambles so empty, that you are afraid to take in fresh air, lest it should sharpen your stomachs? Oh, the _goodly_ Landscape of _Old Fish-street_! which, had it not had the ill-luck to be crooked, was narrow enough to have been your founder's perspective; and where the garrets (perhaps not for want of architecture, but, through _abundance of amity_) are so made, that opposite neighbours may shake hands without stirring from home. Is unanimity of inhabitants in wise Cities better expressed, than by their coherence and uniformity of building, where streets begin, continue, and end in a like stature and shape? But yours (as if they were raised in a general insurrection, _where every man hath a several design_) differ in all things that can make distinction. Here stands one that aims to be a _Palace_, and, next it, another that professes to be a _Hovel_. Here a Giant, there a Dwarf; here slender, there broad; and all most admirably different in their faces, as well as in their height and bulk. I was about to defy any Londoner, who dares pretend there is so much ingenious correspondence in this City, as that he can shew me one house like another. Yet your old houses seem to be reverend and formal, being compared to the fantastical works of the moderns; which have more ovals, niches, and angles, than are in your custards, and are enclosed with pasteboard walls, like those of malicious Turks, who, because themselves are not immortal, and cannot ever dwell where they build, therefore will not be at the charge to provide such lastingness as may entertain their children out of the rain; so slight and so prettily gaudy, that if they could move, they would pass for pageants. It is your custom, where men vary often the mode of their habits, to term the nation fantastical; but, where streets continually change fashion, you should make haste to chain up the City; for it is certainly mad.

"You would think me a malicious traveller, if I should still gaze on your mis-shapen Streets, and take no notice of the beauty of your River; therefore I will pass the importunate noise of your Watermen (who snatch at fares as if they were to catch prisoners, plying the gentry so uncivilly, as if they had never rowed any other passengers but Bear-wards), and now step into one of your pease-cod Boats, whose tilts are not so sumptuous as the roofs of Gondalo's, nor, when you are within, are you at the ease of _Chaise-a-bras_. The community and trade of your River belongs to yourselves; but give a Stranger leave to share in the pleasure of it; which will hardly be in the prospect or freedom of air, unless prospect consisting of variety be made with here a Palace, there a wood-yard, here a garden, there a brew-house. Here dwells a Lord, there a Dyer, and between both _Duomo Commune_. If freedom of air be inferred in the liberty of the subject, where every private man hath authority, for his own profit, to smoke up a Magistrate; then the air of your Thames is open enough, because it is equally free. I will forbear to visit your courtly neighbours at Wapping; not that it will make me giddy to shoot your Bridge, but that I am loth to disturb the _civil silence_ of Billingsgate, which is so great as if the Mariners were always landing to storm the Harbour; therefore, for brevity's sake, I will put to shore again, though I should be constrained, even without my Goloshoes, to land at Puddle-dock.

"I am now returned to visit your Houses, where the roofs (cielings) are so low, that I presume your ancestors were very mannerly, and stood bare to their wives (for I cannot discern how they could wear their high-crowned hats). Yet will I enter; and therefore oblige you much, when you know my aversion to the odour of a certain weed (Tobacco) that governs amongst your coarser acquaintance, as much as Lavender amongst your linen, to which, in my apprehension, your Sea-coal smoke seems a very Portugal perfume. I should here hasten to a period, for fear of suffocation, if I thought you so ungracious to use it in public assemblies; and yet I see it grow so much in fashion, that methinks your children begin to play with broken pipes, instead of corals, to make way for their teeth. You will find my visit short; I cannot stay to eat with you, because your bread is too heavy, and you disdain the slight sustenance of herbs: your drink is too thick, and yet you are seldom over-curious in washing your glasses. Nor will I lodge with you, because your beds seem, to our alcoves, no bigger than coffins; and your curtains so short, as they will hardly serve to inclose your Carriers in Summer; and may be held, if Taffata, to have lined your Grandsires shirts. But though your houses are thin, yet your kitchens are well lined with beef; and the plentiful exercise of your chimneys makes up that canopy of smoke which covers your City; whilst we on the Continent are well contented with a clear sky, entertain flesh as a regale; and we, your poor French frogs, are fain to sing to sallad. You boast that your servants feed better than masters at Paris; and we are satisfied when ours are better taught than fed. You allow yours idleness and high nourishment, to raise their mettle; which is, to make them rude for the honour of Old-England; we inure ours to labour and temperance, that we may allay them; which is to make them civil for the quiet of France. Yours drink malt, and the strong broth of malt, which makes them bold, hot, and adventurous to be soon in command: ours are cooled with weak water, which doth quench their arrogance, and makes them fit to obey long. We plant the Vineyard, and you drink the Wine; by which you beget good spirits, and we get good money. You keep open houses for all that bring you in mirth, till your estate run out of doors, and find new landlords: we shut our gate to all but such whose conversation brings in profit; and so, by the help of what you call ill-nature and parsimony, have the good luck to keep our inheritance for our issue.