Chaucer's miller, "red as a fox." The Normans were firm believers in the virtue of the razor, and so it was that when Harold sent out his spies to ascertain the numbers and position of William the Conqueror's forces, the spies came back with the report that "the host did almost seem to be priests because they had all their face and both their lips shaved." Harold himself had led the fashion of wearing the beard, but by and by William compelled the sturdy Saxons to shaveor at any rate such of them as remained at home, for many left their country rather than part with their beards. But the custom did not long survive the Conqueror. As early as the time of Henry I. we find a certain Bishop Serlo, complaining to the monarch about long hair and bushy beards, which, he declared, the gallant males would not clip lest the stumps should wound the ladies' faces ! The bishop, it seems, carried about with him the tools of the tonsorial art, and

died 1572:

J. Himmel, Theologian, died 1642.

Erasmus Schmidt, Greek Scholar, died 1637.

Jerome Weller, Theologian, (Swallowtail beard.) Henry, with repentant obedience, at once submitted his hirsute growth to the shears of Serlo, who trimmed king and nobles with his own hand. Henry II. as we have seen, got his queen because he had got a beard, and Henry III. also refrained from scraping his chin. Edward I. had both a long beard and a long head, and it was during the reign of his successor, that the favourite old song "Tis merry in hall,

when beards wag all" was composed. Henry IV. had a beard in whose every curl it was once said lurked an intrigue, which perhaps led his son, as a penance for his parent, to present a smooth chin to the world. The Henries were, in truth, a somewhat capricious lot as regards their beards. The sixth of the number was, at any rate in his later years, bearded like a philosopher; the seventh Henry “shaved himself and fleeced his people ;" and the eighth had his beard close clipped perhaps to be in keeping with his bluff bloated face. In some instances a king coming to the throne who was too young to indulge in the luxury of a beard, the fashion has been set in favour of a smooth chin. This was the case with Louis XIV. of France, whose courtiers to keep him in countenance at once gave up their beards to the barbers. Something of the same kind happened when Charles V. came to the Spanish throne. He wore no beard and his courtiers immediately followed

the royal example and scraped themselves smooth every morning. The people, however, did not like the change, their idea being that without the beard there could be no manliness. "We have lost our souls," said they, "since we lost our beards."

Some curious things have been recorded in the way of taxes on beards, and other enactments regarding them. Though Francis I. was himself one of the bearded monarchs he was responsible for a tax on the beards of his clergy, which, he believed, would bring him in a handsome revenue. The tax gave no trouble to the bishops and the wealthier ecclesiastics, who paid it and saved their beards; but the poorer priests had mostly to take to the use of the razor. There came a time, however, when the tables were turned. the succeeding reign a son of the chancellor who had suggested the hated tax, was returning in triumph from the Council of Trent to take possession of the Bishopric of Claremont. He had not dreamed of any opposition, but, behold! the dean and

In

canons closed the brass gates of the chancel, and stood within flourishing shears and razor, and pointing to the statutes de radendis barbis. Notwithstanding his remonstrances and entreaties they declined to induct him until he had sacrificed his beard which was the handsomest of the time. And thus were the sins of the father visited upon the children.

The Russians had an old law by which any one who drew hair from another's beard should be fined four times as much as for cutting off a finger; and the importance and value of the appendage is further illustrated by the fact that although the loss of a leg was estimated at twelve shillings, the loss of the beard was estimated at twenty. Peter the Great thought

From painted glass, 1581.

to civilise his savages by making them shave, and imposed a tax of one hundred roubles on the wealthy and middle classes, and a copeck on peasants and labourers. Now it was a superstition among the poorer people that no beardless son of Adam could ever enter Heaven, and being obliged to part with their beards, the great majority treasured up their hairs to be buried with their bodies. In dealing with his soldiers the Great Peter enlisted the aid of the priests, who cunningly pointed to the fact that they were going to fight the bearded Turk, and that their patron Saint Nicholas, would be unable to distinguish them from their enemies unless they sacrificed their beards. This was all right, and the beards of the beloved Russians went down before the razor in defer

and thus it was that the Russian soldiers demanded to be allowed to abjure the razor so that the Holy Nicholas might have no difficulty in arranging for their protection. Our own former reverence for the beard is well illustrated by the story told of Sir Thomas More, who was beheaded for denying the supremacy of Henry VIII. His usual cheerfulness did not forsake him even on the scaffold. "Help me up," he said to one standing by; "for my coming down let me shift for myself." As he laid his head on the block he begged the executioner to wait a moment while he carefully placed his beard out of the reach of the axe, for, he said, "it hath not committed treason," which reminds one of the story of Simon Lord Lovat, who, the day before his execution on Tower Hill, bade the operator who shaved him, be cautious not to cut his throat, as such an accident would cause disappointment to the gaping crowd on the morrow.

Arquebusier, Carpenters' Hall, 1654. From painted glass.

In the

reign of "good Queen Bess," an attempt was made by some of the heads of Lincoln's Inn to restrain the growth of the legal beard. It was resolved that "no fellow of that house should wear a beard of above a fortnight's growth"--which

no fellow was likely to do if he consulted his own comfort. Although, as we read in the Percy Anecdotes, transgressions of this resolution were punished with fine, loss of commons, and final expulsion, such was the vigorous resistance to the tyrannical order that in the following year all previous orders respecting beards were repealed.

A talk about beards might be prolonged indefinitely, till, in fact, the article should become longer than the chin covering of the sixteenth century painter, John Mayo, who could not only stand upon his beard,

But

but could sit at table and enjoy the spectacle of seeing it-the beard not the table floating out at the open window and occasionally tripping up a passer-by. readers must be spared: they have not all the leisure of a certain Duc de Brissac, whose usual soliloquy, as he adjusted the razor to the proper angle, was-"Timoleon de Cosse, God hath made thee a gentleman, and the King hath made thee a Duke; it is right and fit, however, that thou shouldst have something to do; therefore thou shalt shave thyself."

Our

HERE was a period, between the years 1840 and 1850, when it looked very much indeed as though we were going to yield our long enjoyed sovereignty of the seas to the Americans. The Baltimore clippers bade fair to outrival the ships of this country, and the Stripes and Stars were fast growing familiar colours in lands which heretofore had been accustomed to behold nothing but British bunting. Yankee neighbours were introducing a new form of building into their yards, and the ships which they despatched from Boston to China in 1845 were quite unlike anything that had ever gone to sea before: low hulled; bold of beam; lines sharp as a yacht's; loftily sparred, and of heavy tonnage as the average burthen then went. To these vessels they gave the term of clippers. As this article deals exclusively with clipper ships, it may not be out of place to say a few words concerning the difference between this class of craft and the frigate-built ships of our own country which preceded them. Terms change their signification, and in its original meaning a frigate-built vessel was merely a ship whose decks were arranged similarly to those of a man-of-war of that rating. But latterly the definition was applied to vessels

built very full in their lines, and bluff about the bows, and run, and bilge. The old. Blackwall Liners were all frigate-built ships, and although they could never come up to the clippers of their day in point of sailing qualities, they were very much more weatherly and drier in a gale of wind. The word clipper, on the other hand, to a very great extent explains itself. Young, in his dictionary of marine terms, tells us that it is "a term applied to a sharp built vessel, whereof the stern and stern-post, especially the former, have a great rake, the planking of the bow or forehoods (the timber ends) being carried forward to step in a rabbet in the cutwater. This kind of bow is termed a clipper-bow, and a vessel so built a clipper, or a clipper-built vessel. The fine lines of this vessel, in conjunction with the large quantity of canvas carried upon her, whether rigged as a ship, barque, or schooner, are united to command speed in sailing." This, then, was the type of craft which the Baltimore builders were turning out in great perfection. Their experiments for experiments they then were-resulted in the attainment of high speed. The Mincing Lane merchants, ever eager to get the first consignments of the season's teas, were not long before they began to cast their eyes towards vessels which were delivering their freights weeks ahead of our own ships. Free trade had begun, and the result was that very soon the Thames and the Mersey were crowded with the graceful craft of the Chesapeake. Our own shipping was about this time suffering from the long