I gave the matter more thought when I read his diary entry about having a quarter pipe of port delivered from London. Research tells me that there are rather a lot of bottles in a pipe – 550 litres is one estimate, whereas another refers to 48 cases of 12 (75cc) bottles. Either way, it seems to me that you need a prodigious thirst, a decent sized wine cellar, and a considerable number of bottles and decanters to cope with that volume of wine (137 one litre bottles!). Besides, the quarter pipe was in addition to the home-made currant wine he bottled off each year, and the ‘Mountain Wine’ he bought, or the ‘coniac’ for special occasions.

Richard regularly had casks of wine sent down on the wagon (what an inappropriate expression!)  in the latter years of the Eighteenth Century and then sent back the empty cask by return. So, on 31st December 1797 he mentions paying the carrier Mr Ward for “a small cask of 6 gallons”, charged for by weight at 6d per gallon i.e. three shillings for delivery.

I found it immensely reassuring to read that Richard was able to spend three times more on wine than he did on his taxes – at least he did until Income Tax hit him rather hard in 1800 ! His list of household expenses for 1797 shows a figure of £8/3/5 for wine and only  £2/8/ 3  for taxes. What a man! What a constitution! You try doing that 200 years later….

Mind you, even though the household was prodigiously generous, often noting casks of wine sent round to friends etc, there still seems to have been a lot left over for home consumption. Tantalisingly I have no idea if this consumption of alcohol was responsible for the sad litany of occasions when Richard noted that his dear wife fell over.

It just goes to show, with antecedents like that what hope is there for me staying sober and upright?

But back to glassware. Richard obviously had access to bottles for bottling off his wines – presumably looking like this one from the Museum of London’s collection and having a date of between 1771 and 1800.

But what of the decanters? In this I am indebted to the most excellent website belonging to Laurie Leigh Antiques

They are based in Stow on the Wold, the nearest town to where Richard lived, so I suspect he would have known their premises in Church Street well. They have these splendid decanters, described as being a “pair of Georgian barrel-shaped decanters with three plain neck rings over a band of engraved festoons, bows and pendants. Moulded target stoppers. Circa 1800.”

But I rather hope that Richard would have had the good taste (and the money) to go for the “Rare Georgian mallet-shaped decanter gilded with label for ‘LISBON’ surrounded by fruiting vines and scrollwork suspended by a chain. Cut disc stopper gilded en suite. Atelier of James Giles, London. Circa 1770″

What I find curious is that my offspring did not buy me it as a Christmas present – it cannot have been the price which put them off, a mere £4750, and yet I seem to recall that they chose to purchase some socks for me instead!

And what of the actual glasses? For my money I would go for a dozen of these at £375 each. Each is described as “Fine Georgian goblet with ovoid bowl decorated with large stars and festoons of ‘sprig and oval’ over basal cut facets, on stem cut with hexagonal hollow facets. Circa 1780″.

Or perhaps Richard would have preferred a ”Lovely Georgian wine glass with trumpet-shaped bowl finely engraved with flowers, foliage and scrollwork, on multispiral airtwist stem. Circa 1750″.

Beautiful indeed, but I personally prefer something chunkier, like the “Rare Georgian baluster dram glass with round funnel bowl with basal tear on teared stem with inverted baluster knop and basal flattened knop on folded foot. Circa 1720.

Height: 4 inches. Price: £2400.00″

Even though it is only four inches high, that is a beautiful glass!

Again, for my money (though come to think of it, it is Richard buying these) I would go for something really delicate like the “Lovely Georgian Newcastle baluster goblet with round funnel bowl finely engraved with birds, flowers foliage and scrollwork, on stem with annular knop over elongated inverted baluster knop.

Circa 1730. Height: 7 inches. Price: £2850.00.”

Whatever, these glasses look exquisite and I look forward to calling in on Laurie Leigh’s emporium when I am next in the Cotswolds. Cheers my dears!

Writing a post on Emilie du Châtelet (who was born in 1706,  and who died in 1749) is a real joy: here was a woman who not only believed in ‘carpe diem’ (seize the day) but seized the night as well! She certainly lived life to the full, and in doing also exhibited one of the sharpest brains of her century.

She was born into a wealthy family who lived near the Tuileries Gardens in Paris, in a house with 30 rooms and 17 servants. There was nothing remarkable about her siblings, but Emilie was special. Perhaps over-indulged by her father, most unusually she was coached in Latin, Greek, German and English as well as being taught fencing, riding and gymnastics. She was a good dancer, sang opera and could play the spinet. And she had a particular aptitude for mathematics and the sciences. As a youngster she would spend hours at her studies, often debating physics with the leading scientists of the age over the dinner table. Her incredible aptitude for figures enabled her to gamble at cards with considerable success (she could apparently add up a staggering number of permutations in her head). She then used her winnings to buy more books. Because, as a woman, she was unable to attend university she instead used family money to buy-in the best tutors, in particular the country’s most renowned mathematician Pierre de Maupertuis.

It was his custom to habituate Gradot’s coffee house in Paris, but women were banned from coffee houses. Emilie simply turned up at Gradot’s wearing a man’s suit. The proprietors pretended not to notice they were serving a woman — they didn’t want to lose their scholarly clientele. Emilie became a “regular” at Gradot’s and always arrived fashionably dressed — as a man.

Miniature of Emilie du Châtelet by Marianne Loir

Small wonder that her mother appears to have objected to Emilie’s education – and even her own father remarked “My youngest flaunts her mind, and frightens away the suitors.” Not for long it didn’t…

At the age of 16 she was introduced to the Court at Versailles and became the immediate focus of male attention. The story goes that she was pursued by a man whose advances were unwelcome, so she challenged him to a duel – and won. When she was 19 she agreed to marry a soldier by the name of the Marquis du Chastellet, who had the advantage of being away frequently on military campaigns, or on garrison duty. He was stationed in Semur-en-Auxois in Burgundy; while she spent most of her time in Paris. She did her duty by him, bearing him three children, and then felt free to pursue her other interests of an amorous nature. She had at least two lovers before she started an eighteen month affair with the Duc de Richelieu (when she was 23 years old).

Large indeed – the library actually ran to some 21,000 volumes – a bigger collection than was boasted by many universities - and the laboratory which they established in one of the wings of Cirey was equipped with the finest scientific instruments money could buy, so that the establishment rivalled the Academy of Science in Paris. The two of them collaborated on a succession of experiments. Remember, this was a time when it was quite impossible for a woman to publish a scientific paper in her own name, so it was Voltaire who did the writing, while Emilie was the one who explained to him the underlying theories in physics.

By 1736 Voltaire and du Châtelet were jointly working on the book, Eléments de la philosophie de Newton. The book was published in 1738 under Voltaire’s name, but in the preface he makes it clear that the book was a collaborative process with Emilie. The engraving shows Newton, sitting on High, with Emilie holding a mirror to reflect the truth of his Wisdom, so that Voltaire, the scribe, could render the wisdom into words.

Emilie was no mere assistant to the older Voltaire – she was by far the better physicist and mathematician. In time she embarked on her own translation of Newton´s Principia Mathematica. But it was no mere literal translation: where Newton was obscure she was clear; where Newton glossed over things she explained in detail; and where Newton omitted mathematical evidence to support his theories, she did the calculations and came up with the proof. Her detailed commentaries and explanations brought the masterpiece before a far wider (French) audience than was previously possible – and indeed her translation is still in use today. The book was published by Voltaire after Emilie’s death, but in her own name.

One of the contentious issues of the day was: what is energy? Conventional wisdom (and even Newton subscribed to this) was that energy was the force achieved by multiplying mass by velocity. In mathematical terms, e = mv. But du Châtelet was not happy with this: she was aware of the theories of the German mathematician and philosopher Gottfried Liebniz – but they were just that, theories. Emilie heard of the experiments by a Dutch researcher called William Gravesande, who dropped brass cylinders of a known weight into soft clay, and then measured the depth to which the object sank. On Newton’s principle, doubling the weight should double the depth – but it didn’t, it trebled. Emilie realized that energy was equal to an object’s mass times its velocity squared (E = mv²). 150 years later a young scientist, named Albert Einstein would use this discovery as one of the keys that would unlock his theory of relativity, E = mc².

Some of the anecdotes about Emilie are lovely: she moved her bath into the parlour so that she could bathe while holding forth on weighty and learned matters, surrounded by men sitting around the bath while she wallowed in luxury. Drinks and canapes were served while the learned conversations ebbed and flowed around her! Even the male servants commented that it was her practice to appear naked in front of them when preparing for her ablutions. Here was a woman who was indeed comfortable in her own skin!

Age did not dampen her penchant for younger men. At the age of 40 she took a new lover, a man variously described as a poet and a soldier (or perhaps he was both). When she got pregnant she wrote to Voltaire (April 1749) confiding in him her fears at carrying a child at her age – fears which were to prove to be well founded. She wrote “I am pregnant and you can imagine … how much I fear for my health, even for my life … giving birth at the age of forty.” She added that she was sad at the idea of leaving before she was ready.

Apparently, throughout their fifteen years together Emilie and Voltaire had been regular letter writers – even on days when they were working together. Emilie had bound up Voltaire’s letters in eight red-bound volumes, but tantalisingly these have never been found.

In practice she survived the birth itself, but infection set in, and within a week she died. Voltaire was beside himself: “I have lost the half of myself—a soul for which mine was made.” Her young child, a girl, was to die eighteen months later.

Emilie was a remarkable woman, a scientist of towering intellect, a beacon of her times. She wrote treatises on the Meaning of Happiness and also a critical analysis of The Bible. She proved that women were the intellectual equals of men, and did so not by being a harpy but by being herself, a woman. But to my mind for her eulogy you cannot do better than quote her own words:

“Judge me for my own merits, or lack of them, but do not look upon me as a mere appendage to this great general or that great scholar, this star that shines at the court of France or that famed author. I am in my own right a whole person, responsible to myself alone for all that I am, all that I say, all that I do. It may be that there are metaphysicians and philosophers whose learning is greater than mine, although I have not met them. Yet, they are but frail humans, too, and have their faults; so, when I add the sum total of my graces, I confess I am inferior to no one.”

The split-screen format gives Gillray the ability to compare and contrast – French Liberty (the liberty to starve, as shown by the sans culotte munching on raw onions while sitting in front of the fire) with British Slavery ( a rotund and clearly well-fed John Bull stuffing his face with roast beef while complaining about the tyranny of high taxation).

Here is another Gillray, from 1794. No attempt here to show French fashion  – instead we recoil at the ugly brutishness of the new ruling elite, where the lower orders have seized  control.

 Gillray expresses his horror at the overthrow of Monarchy and Church in this 1793 cartoon, entitled “The Zenith of French Glory  – the Pinnacle of Liberty” in which the revolutionary sans culotte gets a better view of the guillotining of Louis XVI by sitting in all his glory atop the  contraption used for hanging the clergy.

At least when Napoleon came to power Gillray had a specific person he could ridicule (both on account of his stature, and his monstrous hat). Here he shows Napoleon and Talleyrand turning out Gingerbread Kings from the bread oven so that their master-plan for control of Europe can be realized:

James Gillray was born in 1757 and died in 1815.

Dr Franz Mesmer

No, most unlikely , because ‘mesmerize’ and ‘mesmeric’ are words which owe their existence to an Austrian doctor called Mesmer and there is no evidence to show that his surname was used either as a basis for a verb or as an adjective before 1800.

The Oxford Dictionary gives these definitions:

Mesmeric: Pertaining to, characteristic of, producing or produced by mesmerism.

Mesmerism: the doctrine or system popularized by Mesmer according to which a hypnotic state, usually accompanied by a insensibility to pain, and muscular rigidity, can be induced by an influence (at first known as animal magnetism) exercised by an operator over the will and nervous system of the patient.

Franz Anton Mesmer was born near Lake Constance on 23 May 1734 and lived until 5 March 1815. In 1759 he attended Vienna University and a few years later published a dissertation entitled ‘De planetarum influxu in corpus humanum’ (‘On the Influence of the Planets on the Human Body’). He was convinced that there was an energy flow, which he believed was a type of magnetism, running through all living creatures. He surmised that it was blockages to this flow which caused illness.

It must be remembered that magnetism was the new ‘big thing’ in science. Mesmer distinguished his magnetism, which he termed animal magnetism, from planetary magnetism and mineral magnetism (such as could be found in lodestones). He would experiment by bleeding patients and then running a magnet over the wound, noting that this would staunch the flow. Later he experimented with waving a wooden ‘wand’ over the cut and achieved the same result. But he did not consider that the waving of the stick to and fro caused hypnosis (indeed the concept of hypnosis had not been articulated until 1843 when James Braid, a Scottish physician, coined the word).

Dr Mesmer's Paris salon

Instead he thought that the wand and laying on of hands demonstrated ‘animal magnetism’ at work. In this he was much influenced by the work of Father Gasser, an Austrian priest who was, unwittingly, a great hypnotist. Mesmer studied Gassner’s work and carried out his own experiments but found himself up against a large amount of opposition and ridicule. He headed for Paris, reasoning that the inhabitants would be far more receptive to new ideas. He was right, and he quickly became famous. To start with he would treat patients individually, but realized that he could make more money if he treated people as a group.

Patients in a row under the magnetized oak

He used two different approaches: in one he sat his patients beneath the branches of a ‘magnetized’ oak tree, while those seeking an indoor treatment were crowded in around a baquet or magnetized tub.

An English physician who witnessed the scene around the baquet wrote:

“In the middle of the room is placed a vessel of about a foot and a half high which is called here a “baquet”. It is so large that twenty people can easily sit round it; near the edge of the lid which covers it, there are holes pierced corresponding to the number of persons who are to surround it;

I like this etching, dated 1816, showing two English soldiers walking in an effeminate manner, arm in arm. One is a corpulent John Bullish figure, his belly hanging out, and the other dragging his sword along the ground, wears an ill-fitting jacket. This etching, and the following ones, are shown courtesy of the Fitzwilliam Museum.

This print, dated two years earlier, reflects the French perception of the English as being more fond of their horses than their wives: there has been an accident and both horse and female rider are injured. The English husband rushes to attend …. the horse.And just to show that the French thought English dining manners a trifle strange (especially by sending the ladies from the room after the food has been consumed, so that they could drink to excess) here is a splendid print. So there we have it: the English were renowned drunken p*ss artists. A Frenchman would, of course, have preferred to have spent time with the ladies than in the company of other men! The English males love each other, then their horses, and then their women, in that order!

Her name was Mary Anning, born in Lyme Regis in Dorset on 21st May 1799. She cannot be said to have had an auspicious start in life. She was one of ten children – but eight died in childhood. An elder sister had already been called Mary but she had perished in a fire when her clothes were ignited from some burning wood shavings. Our heroine was born five months after this tragic death, and was named Mary in memory of her dead sibling.

Mary had luck, of a sort, on her side. When she was eighteen months old she was being held in the arms of a neighbour called Elizabeth Haskings who was in a group of women watching a travelling show. A storm sprang up and the group took shelter beneath an elm tree, but a bolt of lightning struck the tree, killing three of the women including Elizabeth. Yet Mary was apparently unscathed. Fate had something quite remarkable in store for the young girl…

Mary’s parents were Dissenters, meaning that education opportunities were limited and the family were subject to legal discrimination. A member of the Congregationalist Church, she attended Sunday School and here learned the rudiments of reading and writing. The Congregational Church, unlike the Anglican Church, attached great importance to education, particularly for young girls, and she was encouraged in her development by the pastor Revd James Wheaton. Her prized possession was apparently a copy of the Dissenters’ Theological Magazine and Review in which the good Reverend had apparently written two articles; one reiterated the importance of understanding that the world was created by God in seven days, and the other, somewhat curiously, suggested that a study of the new science of geology was to be encouraged.

Father was a carpenter and cabinet maker and business was tough. Even worse, her father died when Mary was eleven, leaving the family without any apparent means of support.

After the father’s death the destitute family eked a living finding fossils along what is now termed the Jurassic coast in Dorset. In 1811 Mary’s elder brother Joseph found a fossilized skull of what was thought to be a crocodile protruding from the crumbling cliffs of Blue Lias. Mary was given the task of slowly exposing the ancient creature, uncovering not just the skull but 60 vertebrae. It was difficult work, scrambling to reach the exposed rock face, at risk from the tides and rock falls, but the young girl showed an aptitude for the work. Besides, there were rewards: the skeleton was bought by the local Lord of the Manor called Henry Hoste Henley for £23. He in turn sold it to a private collector called William Bullock, and he exhibited it in London with the rest of his fossil collection in his Museum of Natural Curiosities. In 1819 it was bought as a ‘crocodile in a fossil state’ by the British Museum, for £45. The creature was eventually called Ichthyosaurus (‘fish lizard’) by the scientists Henry de la Beche and William Conybeare. It was the first specimen of Ichthyosaurus ever recorded, and both men went on to make their name on the back of Mary’s efforts.

The find was to change Mary’s life and, in time, her studies of anatomy, geology, paleontology and scientific illustration were to propel her to considerable fame (but never fortune). The world of scientific discovery was not just dominated by men, it was dominated by Anglicans, people of good education and usually privilege. An ill-educated, impecunious, girl from her background was never going to find acceptance easy.

She did however have supporters. Her big break came in 1820. Lieutenant-Colonel Thomas James Birch had previously got to know Mary and her brother Joseph and had bought a number of items from them. He decided to auction off some of these specimens and the sale generated huge interest from all over the country and indeed throughout Europe. The specimens were sold for £400, a huge sum at the time, and the generous Lieutenant-Colonel handed the entire proceeds over to Mary.

In time she became the focus of attention – not just collectors and scientists would visit her tiny beach-front shop, but also socialites keen to see and speak with this witty, knowledgeable but poorly-educated woman.

Throughout the 1820’s and 30’s she hammered away, discovering the long-necked plesiosaurus or sea dragon in 1823, a ‘flying dragon’ i.e. the pterodactyl (in 1828) and hundreds, upon hundreds of other fossils. Squaloraia a cross between a shark and a ray, was discovered in 1829. In the winter of 1830, she found a new, large-headed Plesiosaurus, and sold it for £210. She became an expert on the delightful subject of bezoar stones (now known as coprolites, that is to say, fossilised faeces!). She also proved that belemnite fossils contained fossilised ink sacs, by grinding up the fossilised remains and mixing them with water to produce an inky substance similar to sepia ink in squids. Her brother Joseph demonstrated this with his drawing of one of Mary´s fossils, shown here.

She helped show the astonished world what marine life looked like in the Jurassic period, some 140 to 200 million years ago, before mammals ruled the earth. Scientists such as Henry de la Beche helped her financially when he handed to her the proceeds of sale from his engraving entitled Duria Antiquior, a more ancient Dorset – a scene of prehistoric life based upon fossils which she had found and identified.

Not everyone accepted her without question: the French anatomist Georges Cuvier dismissed one of her finds as a fake, but Mary was able to refute the allegation of forgery and, in fairness, Cuvier acknowledged his error and became a fan of hers. For some, they simply couldn’t bring themselves to give credit to the achievements of a mere woman – and a poorly educated one at that. Even her own gender seemed amazed at her skill and knowledge, as in this diary entry, made in 1824, by Lady Harriet Sivester, after visiting Mary Anning:

“. . . the extraordinary thing in this young woman is that she has made herself so thoroughly acquainted with the science that the moment she finds any bones she knows to what tribe they belong. She fixes the bones on a frame with cement and then makes drawings and has them engraved. . . It is certainly a wonderful instance of divine favour – that this poor, ignorant girl should be so blessed, for by reading and application she has arrived to that degree of knowledge as to be in the habit of writing and talking with professors and other clever men on the subject, and they all acknowledge that she understands more of the science than anyone else in this kingdom.”

Ah, so that was it: Divine favour, not skill and hard work ….

For years she carried on chipping away at rocks with her hammer, accompanied by her faithful dog Troy, who always appears beside her in paintings of the day. Eventually in 1833 Troy was killed in a rock-fall when the tide undermined the ledge he was standing on, but Mary was unharmed. She was however distraught at the loss of her constant companion. She knew only too well the irony that it was the really high tides in winter which revealed the fossil deposits, just as it was the same tides which made the rock face unstable and liable to collapse.

Hers was not to be a long and happy life. She died of breast cancer at the age of 47 on 9th March 1847. In her lifetime success and recognition evaded her. She had been barred from admission to the Geological Society on account of her gender (women were not admitted to their ranks until 1904). At one stage she wrote “The world has used me so unkindly, I fear it has made me suspicious of everyone” and only one journal ever published anything from her – and that a letter to the editor, not an article. And one, only one, other geologist named a specimen after her in her lifetime, when the Swiss-American naturalist Louis Agassiz named two fossil fish after her, Acrodus anningiae and Belenstomus anningiae.

The gravestone marking where Mary & her brother are buried.

In fairness to the Geographical Society they did help her financially through her final illness. She was buried in St Michael’s Church in Lyme Regis.

The Mary Anning window

Recognition came after her death: three years later the Geographical Society paid for a stained glass window at the church in her honour. The inscription reads “This window is sacred to the memory of Mary Anning of this parish, who died 9 March AD 1847 and is erected by the vicar and some members of the Geological Society of London in commemoration of her usefulness in furthering the science of geology, as also of her benevolence of heart and integrity of life.”

Finally, more than a hundred and fifty years after she died, the Royal Society included her in their 2010 list of the ten British women who have most influenced the history of science. Some might say: better late than never.

Many happy returns of the day, Mary!

Post script: I particularly enjoyed doing this post because my ancestor Richard Hall was an avid fossil collector. I still have some of the items he collected along with his booklet of fossil drawings. I especially liked the way that he believed that the ammonites were actually long worms, curled up in death, with their mouths in the centre of the spiral, turned to stone. More details appear in The Journal of a Georgian Gentleman.

First let us look at these two charming ladies appearing facing each other in a cut-away picture (copyright of British Museum) of a carriage known as a vis-à-vis. They are forced to sit on the floor of the coach because their hair pieces, adorned with what appears to be fruit and veg and plumed feathers, are too high to fit under the roof of the vehicle. The roof of the carriage is ornamented with two ducal coronets. The engraving is dated 25 May 1776.

Twenty years later the fashion for wigs may have moved on, but the range of choices facing the lady who wished to stay ahead in the fashion stakes was huge: as evidenced by this cartoon from 1798 illustrating women trying on their wigs.

And of course no two women look the same in the same outfit, as shown in this parody by Gillray dated 1794 (also from the British Museum). But if we are into ostrich feathers, how about this lovely print of a phaeton, whose small body is raised on springs high above the wheels. It is drawn by four absurdly small horses being driven by a lady standing up and wielding an enormously long whip; next to her sits a hatless man terrified out of his mind, his hands held up, his face contorted with fear.  On the side of the carriage is a crest – a stag’s head in an oval, with the motto “Fashion”.

Beneath the design is engraved;

“Talk not to me Sir of yr old Fashion’d rules,

E’en laugh’d at by Children, the Joke of the Schools:

They might do for yr meek minded Matrons of old,

Who knew no use of Spirit but thier Servants to scold.

But for me Z——ds & Blood am not I fit to command,

I can swear Sir, & What’s more drive four Horses in Hand.” 29 June 1781

The British Museum suggests that the lady may be Agnes Townshend, a noted courtesan, known as vis-à-vis Townshend, who drove her coach and four all over the country. Personally I favour the Lewis Walpole Library suggestion that the lady in question is the Duchess of Devonshire (hence the ducal coronet). Besides why would vis-à-vis Townsend be driving a phaeton as opposed to a vis-à-vis?

While on the subject of the gorgeous Georgiana, you remember the scene in The Duchess where her wig is set alight by a candle? I rather like this Rowlandson take on the risks of self-immolation entitled a Doleful Disaster, or Miss Fubby Fatarnmin’s Wig Caught Fire.

Gillray meanwhile mocks the penny pinching ladies of fashion who seek to save a guinea by missing off the  wig powder:

And unless I am very much mistaken, the hairdresser on the left of the picture is a bit of a ringer for the picture of the French hairdresser running to get to his next customer, who featured in my blog 2 days ago:

On the other hand, I think I would prefer to have the French hairdresser cut my locks than this one of the English Village Barber,whose board advertises not only categories of wigs but also food and drink, washing aids, and cures for various ailments: “BOBS, BOB-Majors SCRATCHES [plain wigs] & other wigs made here, also SAUSAGES, WASHBALLS[soap] Black Puddings Scotch Pills, Powder for the ITCH, RED HERRINGS, BREECHES BALLS & small BEER by the maker

Mind you, hairdressers have never been thought of as entirely trustworthy – hence this lovely warning entitled The Boarding School Hairdresser. Note the leg placed  indecently between the girls thighs!  Still. she looks happy…            .

Men of course had to suffer a full head shave if they wanted their wigs to fit snugly, and without head lice causing endless itching! Hence, in this delightful etching by the splendidly named Mr Bunbury we see the hapless man getting lathered up in The Shaver and the Shavee:

 But let us return to the full horrors of the high fashion wig as worn by the ladies of taste and discernment, and at the same time have a subtle dig at the French who were always considered just a bit too far off the graph when it came to subtlety!

Dated 1771 it shows the lady bending forward and terrifying the living daylights

out of the cat, dog and parrot – and the hapless male!

And to end with, a couple of quite quite delicious prints of dubious taste (all brought about because I have an appointment to have my hair cut this week!:

The list reveals that the building (other than the shop and counting room) consisted of thirteen separate rooms. No mention is made of a privy – presumably because it was outside.

Even the shop had a feather bed – no doubt because an apprentice slept there overnight. Indeed it is the sheer number of beds which catches the eye. Assuming that a bolster would not have been appropriate to a single bed, it looks as though there were seven double beds, one single, plus a “straw pallice” i.e. palliasse. In theory sixteen people could be in occupation. From the description of the Hall household it is assumed that there were only two domestic servants “living in” – presumably in “Room No. 3 – Left hand” with its “Stump bedstead…a wainscoat chest of drawers, round table, square dressing glass” (i.e. mirror) and stove with “tin fender”.

The other rooms contain rather more furniture and benefit from “window curtains” (as distinct from “bed curtains”).

In the main bedroom there is a half tester bed (i.e. with a canopy) with what is described as “Harrateen furniture” (Harrateen being a type of woollen fabric, used here for the drapes, canopy and curtains). The main bed had a goose feather mattress and pillows – other mattresses appear to have been mostly “feather” (of unspecified origin) or “flock” or straw. “Scotch carpet” appears to have been laid in strips – presumably around the sides and bottom of the bed – in most rooms. Only the Dining Room had a Wilton carpet.

As the Hall family would only have justified half the beds, the rest were either an indication that rooms were let out (a common way of generating an income, then as now) or shows rather more than one apprentice or shop assistant living in.

I appreciate that a mere list can seem as dry as dust, but just in case any novel writers out there are looking for authenticity, here is the list of all the things at One London Bridge this week, 218 years ago.

Inventory of the Household Furniture Linen China & Books taken at Mr Wm. Hall, hosier

No.1 London Bridge May 15, 1794

No. 1 Right hand and spair back

A half-tester bedstead and crimson Harrateen Furniture

A goose-feather bed, bolster and pillow. 2 blankets and a quilt

A truckle bedstead – a feather bed. Bolster, three blankets and a quilt

A walnut chest of drawers. 6 stained chairs – canvas seats

A corner night chair. A table clock – black Ebony Case by Smolling (?).

3 slips of carpets. A Harrateen window curtain

No 2 Right hand front

A bath stove, serpentine fender. Shovel, tongs and fender

A 4-part bedstead, Linen furniture. A feather bed, bolster & pillow

3 blankets. A linen quilt. A pair glass in a walnut tree Gilt frame.

A walnut tree kneehole dressing table. A ditto low chest of drawers.

6 black dyed chairs – matted seat A square Scotch carpet 2 slips of Ditto.

A wainscoat. Pillow, Chair, Table.  5 paintings on Glass.

No 3 left hand

A Stump (?) bedstead. A feather bed bolster & pillow. 3 blankets a wainscoat chest of drawers a ditto round table. A square dressing glass

A Scotch carpet. A brass front stove, tin fender.

No 4 Back room

A high wire fender. A parrot cage. 3 Cloaths horses. A large round table

A (?) Lanthorn (lantern). Sundry boxes. A folding board and sundries

A hatch and stairs

No. 5 Spair back room

A 4 part bedstead with Green Damask furniture – a goose feather bed bolster,

2 pillows, a flock mattress. A blanket, a green damask window curtain.

A Mahogany one drawer table. An oval swing Dressing Glass.

4 Mahogany Chairs – horse hair seats. Sundry fossils and shells.

A  basin stand, a wainscoat bureau. A Scotch carpet to go around the bed.

No. 6 – Spair right hand front room

A bath stove. Shovel tongs and poker. A 4 part bedstead, mahogany feet.

Pillows. Printed cotton furniture. A feather bed, bolster, 2 pillows. A straw pallice.

3 blankets, a white cotton counterpane. 2 sets of cotton festoon window curtains.

A compress front mahogany Chest of drawers. A swing glass in a Mahogany frame.

A Mahogany double chest of drawers. 6 Mahogany chairs, horsehair seats.

A Scotch carpet and 2 bedsides (i.e. slips). A Mahogany basin stand Jug and Basin

A small ditto Cloaths Horse. Side bed. A small feather bed.

2 pillows, 2 flannel blankets a Marseilles quilt, an India picture. 2 China jars & Covers. 2 ….(?) & 2 pieces blown glass.

No. 7 – Spair left hand

An iron grate on hearth stones. A harrateen window curtain & rod

A Mahogany cloaths press with folding doors & drawer under.

A Mahogany bureau. A small ditto. An easy chair. Cushion. Linen case.

A Scotch carpet 2 setts of window curtains. ….….(?) A purple ditto.

Linen

4 Diaper Table cloths,2 small ditto. 4 Damask Breakfast Ditto

4 Diaper Table Cloths. 1 pair Lancashire Sheets

4 pairs Russia Ditto, 3 pair Ditto. 2 pair Lancashire Ditto, 2 odd sheets

8 pairs Pillowcases, 6 Diaper Hand Towels. 9 Huckerback towels – 2 Jack Ditto

2 old Ditto. 20 hand towels. A breakfast cloth – 2 Pudding Ditto

A cotton counterpane. A sett of blue check bed Curtains

Books

One vol. Folio ½ bound. 1 Ditto unbound. 5 Ditto 4to (Quarto). Plates to ditto. Miscellaneous Tracks (tracts) relating to Antiquity. Baileys Dictionary. Buchans Domestic Medicine. Thompsons Travels. Non-conformists Memorial, 2 volumes, Winchesters Tracks. Philadelphian Magazine. A Dictionary. Harveys Meditations. Herberts Poems. James Beauties (?). 36 bound books. Sundry pamphlets – 4 bound. Pashams Bible. Hymns & Psalms. A family bible. Crudens Concordances. Clark on the Testament.4 maps of Europe Asia Africa & America. An orrery. 3 Portraits framed & Glazed.

No.8 Spair back room

A fretwork Mahogany Tea Table. A Japan Ditto. A variable (?) one-draw Table.

A Draft Board. A slip of floor cloth. Sundry stones shells & fossils.

A painting of fruit, sundry shells in a drawer.

No. 9 Dining Room

Fender shovel Tongs & Poker. 3 sett of blue Damask festoon window curtains.

A steel stove.  2 oval pier glasses in carved gilt frames. A square pillar & claw Table.

2 square mahogany Dining Tables with 2 flaps.  A round Ditto.

A Mahogany Dumb Waiter. 6 Ditto Chairs Sattin hair seats brass nailed. 2 Elbow Ditto. A Wilton carpet.

A marble slab on a Mahogany stand – a Mahogany book Case, Glass Doors.

A Harpsichord in a walnut tree case by Kirkhoffe …(?), a violin, a flute, a high Mahogany Chair, a Ditto stool, a Japan’d Urn, a Mahogany stand, 2 waiters.

Cut(lery) and knife tray. Sundry Moths & insects framed & Glazed. Sundry Stones Shells & Fossils. A Canary Bird & Cage. A Mahogany Knife case.

A set of cruets with Silver Tops – 2 small miniature portraits.

No. 10 Kitchen

1 Trivet, 2 Crane Hooks. Footman(i.e. kettle stand) 2 Spits…(?) Dripping Pan Stand.

2 Gridirons. A copper Boiler. A Tea Kettle. 2 Porrage pots & covers. 3 Saucepans.

A chocolate pot. A pair of Princes metal candlesticks. 1 pr shorter Ditto.3 high brass Ditto. A brass ladle. A tin fish kettle plate & cover. 5 Saucepans & covers.

6 candlesticks. 10 patties. Loose tea ware (?). Bread basket. Japan Sugar Ditto. 3 Tin Cannisters. 14 Oval & round dishes.12 large plates. 6 small Ditto.

Sundry Queens Ware. 4 water (?) plates. A meat steamer(?) lined with Tin. A Deal table with 2 flaps.6 wood chairs. A pair of bellows. Salt box. Spice Box.2 sieves. A Japan Patent Jack. A Deal cupboard under Dresser. A Hatch on stairs.

No. 11 Store Room

An eight day clock in a walnut tree case by Wright. A Square Mahogany 2-flap Dining Table. A 2-flap Deal Table. A small cloaths horse. A plate warmer.

2 Frying pans. A footman (i.e. kettle stand). A tin Fish Kettle. A copper warming pan. A brass Ditto. A small Lanthorn (lantern). A Japan Tea Tray. 3 Flat irons & 2 stands.

A pewter(?) water dish. 4 round dishes. 10 plates. A tureen. A copper stew pan. A bell. Metal Saucepan.

1 brass 1 copper Urn. Part of a set of China containing 35 pieces. A tea-pot

Cover.6 cups & saucers. 6 blue and white cups & saucers. Basin. 6 candle

Basins & Saucers. 27 china plates. 3 Ditto bowls. A dragon basin. 2 mugs.

A tureen cover. 14 soup plates. 4 Dishes. 9 Patties. 4 basons.2 jugs. 4

Round dishes. 15 pieces of Queens Ware.4 Red dishes & sundry Jars. 2

Glass Decanters. 20 wine & jelly Glasses. A Tumbler. A Mahogany

knife tray. 2 Waiters. 1 Japan Ditto. Candle box, lamp, 2 pairs of plated

Candlesticks. A dish cross (?). 2 pairs of snuffers. A plated stand. A plated

Cruet (?) with 5 glasses. 12 brown-handled knives & forks.12 small Ditto.

10 forks.

Shop No. 12

A feather bed, bolster & pillows. 2 blankets & a rug.

No. 13 Cellar

A beer stand. 2 wash tubs. 2 pails. Sundry Garden Pots

All the Effects in the Foregoing Inventory is valued at One Hundred & Twenty Five pounds fifteen shillings & 6d by

John Fletcher

for Samuel Burton, Houndsditch.

The family interest in astronomy was reflected in the “orrery” – a clockwork mechanism used to show the movement of the planets around the sun, and named after the Earl of Orrery. Some years earlier the Earl had commissioned the instrument maker J Rowley to make just such an instrument copying the invention of George Graham.

The list of linen is interesting with its reference to “Diaper Table Cloths” – diaper meaning “diamond patterned”, Huckerback towels – which the Oxford Dictionary defines as being “made of stout linen or cotton fabric” and “Jack Towels” meaning roller towels. The family appear to have been musical, with a “harpsichord in a Walnut Tree case” along with a violin and a flute. Ornaments seem to have been dominated by shells and fossils,many of which are still in my possession, along with miniature portraits and “sundry Moths and Insects framed and glazed”.

Even the canary in its cage was listed in the inventory (in the Dining Room, next to the Mahogany Knife Case). The parrot cage in the Back Room was presumably without an inmate (since none was mentioned) but indicates the popularity of keeping caged birds as pets.

The total value of the entire household contents came to a modest £125.15s.6d. (the equivalent of perhaps £6,500) but this may well have reflected that at ten pounds per room this was a “family valuation”.

A picture showing One London Bridge (then, the postal address of premises North of the River Thames, immediately to the left of the Church of St Magnus the Martyr, and behind the old water wheel).

Many more details about One London Bridge can be found in The Journal of a Georgian Gentleman but I find it fascinating to think that I actually know in which room in the house some of the items I now own were originally kept.

And. if we return to the subject of muffs in satire, a curious cartoon entitled “The Fox Muff” dated 1787, ridiculing Charles James  Fox, 1749-1806. It comes courtesy of the Lewis Walpole Library at Yale.

I also came across this print (below right) of The Peasant of the Alps (courtesy of Grosvenor Prints) which is suitably absurd, and, combining this post with my blog about how the English view the French, a rather nice etching entitled “A French hairdreser” which according to the excellent Lewis Walpole Library site, reflects the fact that by the turn of the century there were some fifty thousand hairdressers in Britain, the best of them French. I certainly wouldn’t trust him with my barnet (well, if I had one…)!

And finally, an image from Christie’s auction house: “Portrait of Louise Henriette de Bourbon, Duchesse de Chartres and Duchesse d’Orléans (1726-1759) in a fur trimmed cloak and muff. French School.” Nice muff, shame about the face…

The Muff was a fashion accessory which got larger and larger throughout the 1700′s. They clearly went to a huge size, and satirists were never slow to ridicule  fashion.

And where would you buy your muff? From a muff shop of course!

This print is entitled “Such things are” and  contains the caption ‘That SUCH THINGS ARE most strange yet Common. What things? For sure they are not Women’

The muff, a cylinder of fur or fabric, was in fact worn by both men and women in the 18th century.

This is a splendid  silk one (from the Metropolitan Museum of Art) dated 1780.

and another, made of feathers and fur, from the same source and stated as being from ‘the third quarter of the eighteenth century’.