by Mark Twain
not rise again.
FOOTNOTES
To Frivolity
The historical consistency of 1601 indicates that Twain must have given
the subject considerable thought. The author was careful to speak only
of men who conceivably might have been in the Virgin Queen's closet and
engaged in discourse with her.
THE CHARACTERS
At this time (1601) Queen Elizabeth was 68 years old. She speaks of
having talked to "old Rabelais" in her youth. This might have been
possible as Rabelais died in 1552, when the Queen was 19 years old.
Among those in the party were Shakespeare, at that time 37 years old; Ben
Jonson, 27; and Sir Walter Raleigh, 49. Beaumont at the time was 17, not
16. He was admitted as a member of the Inner Temple in 1600, and his
first translations, those from Ovid, were first published in 1602.
Therefore, if one were holding strictly to the year date, neither by age
nor by fame would Beaumont have been eligible to attend such a gathering
of august personages in the year 1601; but the point is unimportant.
THE ELIZABETHAN WRITERS
In the Conversation Shakespeare speaks of Montaigne's Essays. These were
first published in 1580 and successive editions were issued in the years
following, the third volume being published in 1588. "In England
Montaigne was early popular. It was long supposed that the autograph of
Shakespeare in a copy of Florio's translation showed his study of the
Essays. The autograph has been disputed, but divers passages, and
especially one in The Tempest, show that at first or second hand the poet
was acquainted with the essayist." (Encyclopedia Brittanica.)
The company at the Queen's fireside discoursed of Lilly (or Lyly),
English dramatist and novelist of the Elizabethan era, whose novel,
Euphues, published in two parts, 'Euphues', or the 'Anatomy of Wit'
(1579) and 'Euphues and His England' (1580) was a literary sensation.
It is said to have influenced literary style for more than a quarter of a
century, and traces of its influence are found in Shakespeare. (Columbia
Encyclopedia).
The introduction of Ben Jonson into the party was wholly appropriate,
if one may call to witness some of Jonson's writings. The subject under
discussion was one that Jonson was acquainted with, in The Alchemist:
Act. I, Scene I,
FACE: Believe't I will.
SUBTLE: Thy worst. I fart at thee.
DOL COMMON: Have you your wits? Why, gentlemen, for love----
Act. 2, Scene I,
SIR EPICURE MAMMON: ....and then my poets, the same that writ so subtly
of the fart, whom I shall entertain still for that subject and again in
Bartholomew Fair
NIGHTENGALE: (sings a ballad)
Hear for your love, and buy for your money.
A delicate ballad o' the ferret and the coney.
A preservative again' the punk's evil.
Another goose-green starch, and the devil.
A dozen of divine points, and the godly garter
The fairing of good counsel, of an ell and three-quarters.
What is't you buy?
The windmill blown down by the witche's fart,
Or Saint George, that, O! did break the dragon's heart.
GOOD OLD ENGLISH CUSTOM
That certain types of English society have not changed materially in
their freedom toward breaking wind in public can be noticed in some
comparatively recent literature. Frank Harris in My Life, Vol. 2,
Ch. XIII, tells of Lady Marriott, wife of a judge Advocate General,
being compelled to leave her own table, at which she was entertaining Sir
Robert Fowler, then the Lord Mayor of London, because of the suffocating
and nauseating odors there. He also tells of an instance in parliament,
and of a rather brilliant bon mot spoken upon that occasion.
"While Fowler was speaking Finch-Hatton had shewn signs of restlessness;
towards the end of the speech he had moved some three yards away from the
Baronet. As soon as Fowler sat down Finch-Hatton sprang up holding his
handkerchief to his nose:
"'Mr. Speaker,' he began, and was at once acknowledged by the Speaker,
for it was a maiden speech, and as such was entitled to precedence by the
courteous custom of the House, 'I know why the Right Honourable Member
from the City did not conclude his speech with a proposal. The only way
to conclude such a speech appropriately would be with a motion!'"
AEOLIAN CREPITATIONS
But society had apparently degenerated sadly in modern times, and even in
the era of Elizabeth, for at an earlier date it was a serious--nay,
capital--offense to break wind in the presence of majesty. The Emperor
Claudius, hearing that one who had suppressed the urge while paying him
court had suffered greatly thereby, "intended to issue an edict, allowing
to all people the liberty of giving vent at table to any distension
occasioned by flatulence:"
Martial, too (Book XII, Epigram LXXVII), tells of the embarrassment of
one who broke wind while praying in the Capitol,
"One day, while standing upright, addressing his prayers to Jupiter,
Aethon farted in the Capitol. Men laughed, but the Father of the Gods,
offended, condemned the guilty one to dine at home for three nights.
Since that time, miserable Aethon, when he wishes to enter the Capitol,
goes first to Paterclius' privies and farts ten or twenty times. Yet, in
spite of this precautionary crepitation, he salutes Jove with constricted
buttocks." Martial also (Book IV, Epigram LXXX), ridicules a woman who
was subject to the habit, saying,
"Your Bassa, Fabullus, has always a child at her side, calling it her
darling and her plaything; and yet--more wonder--she does not care for
children. What is the reason then. Bassa is apt to fart. (For which
she could blame the unsuspecting infant.)"
The tale is told, too, of a certain woman who performed an aeolian
crepitation at a dinner attended by the witty Monsignieur Dupanloup,
Bishop of Orleans, and that when, to cover up her lapse, she began to
scrape her feet upon the floor, and to make similar noises, the Bishop
said, "Do not trouble to find a rhyme, Madam!"
Nay, worthier names than those of any yet mentioned have discussed the
matter. Herodotus tells of one such which was the precursor to the fall
of an empire and a change of dynasty--that which Amasis discharges while
on horseback, and bids the envoy of Apries, King of Egypt, catch and
deliver to his royal master. Even the exact manner and posture of
Amasis, author of this insult, is described.
St. Augustine (The City of God, XIV:24) cites the instance of a man who
could command his rear trumpet to sound at will, which his learned
commentator fortifies with the example of one who could do so in tune!
Benjamin Franklin, in his "Letter to the Royal Academy of Brussels" has
canvassed suggested remedies for alleviating the stench attendant upon
these discharges:
"My Prize Question therefore should be: To discover some Drug, wholesome
and--not disagreeable, to be mixed with our common food, or sauces, that
shall render the natural discharges of Wind from our
Bodies not only
inoffensive, but agreeable as Perfumes.
"That this is not a Chimerical Project & altogether impossible, may
appear from these considerations. That we already have some knowledge of
means capable of varying that smell. He that dines on stale Flesh,
especially with much Addition of Onions, shall be able to afford a stink
that no Company can tolerate; while he that has lived for some time on
Vegetables only, shall have that Breath so pure as to be insensible of
the most delicate Noses; and if he can manage so as to avoid the Report,
he may anywhere give vent to his Griefs, unnoticed. But as there are
many to whom an entire Vegetable Diet would be inconvenient, & as a
little quick Lime thrown into a Jakes will correct the amazing Quantity
of fetid Air arising from the vast Mass of putrid Matter contained in
such Places, and render it pleasing to the Smell, who knows but that a
little Powder of Lime (or some other equivalent) taken in our Food, or
perhaps a Glass of Lime Water drank at Dinner, may have the same Effect
on the Air produced in and issuing from our Bowels?"
One curious commentary on the text is that Elizabeth should be so fond of
investigating into the authorship of the exhalation in question, when she
was inordinately fond of strong and sweet perfumes; in fact, she was
responsible for the tremendous increase in importations of scents into
England during her reign.
"YE BOKE OF YE SIEUR MICHAEL DE MONTAINE"
There is a curious admixture of error and misunderstanding in this part
of the sketch. In the first place, the story is borrowed from Montaigne,
where it is told inaccurately, and then further corrupted in the telling.
It was not the good widows of Perigord who wore the phallus upon their
coifs; it was the young married women, of the district near Montaigne's
home, who paraded it to view upon their foreheads, as a symbol, says our
essayist, "of the joy they derived therefrom." If they became widows,
they reversed its position, and covered it up with the rest of their
head-dress.
The "emperor" mentioned was not an emperor; he was Procolus, a native of
Albengue, on the Genoese coast, who, with Bonosus, led the unsuccessful
rebellion in Gaul against Emperor Probus. Even so keen a commentator as
Cotton has failed to note the error.
The empress (Montaigne does not say "his empress") was Messalina, third
wife of the Emperor Claudius, who was uncle of Caligula and foster-father
to Nero. Furthermore, in her case the charge is that she copulated with
twenty-five in a single night, and not twenty-two, as appears in the
text. Montaigne is right in his statistics, if original sources are
correct, whereas the author erred in transcribing the incident.
As for Proculus, it has been noted that he was associated with Bonosus,
who was as renowned in the field of Bacchus as was Proculus in that of
Venus (Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire). The feat of
Proculus is told in his own words, in Vopiscus, (Hist. Augustine, p. 246)
where he recounts having captured one hundred Sarmatian virgins, and
unmaidened ten of them in one night, together with the happenings
subsequent thereto.
Concerning Messalina, there appears to be no question but that she was a
nymphomaniac, and that, while Empress of Rome, she participated in some
fearful debaucheries. The question is what to believe, for much that we
have heard about her is almost certainly apocryphal.
The author from whom Montaigne took his facts is the elder Pliny, who,
in his Natural History, Book X, Chapter 83, says, "Other animals become
sated with veneral pleasures; man hardly knows any satiety. Messalina,
the wife of Claudius Caesar, thinking this a palm quite worthy of an
empress, selected for the purpose of deciding the question, one of the
most notorious women who followed the profession of a hired prostitute;
and the empress outdid her, after continuous intercourse, night and day,
at the twenty-fifth embrace."
But Pliny, notwithstanding his great attainments, was often a retailer of
stale gossip, and in like case was Aurelius Victor, another writer who
heaped much odium on her name. Again, there is a great hiatus in the
Annals of Tacitus, a true historian, at the period covering the earlier
days of the Empress; while Suetonius, bitter as he may be, is little more
than an anecdotist. Juvenal, another of her detractors, is a prejudiced
witness, for he started out to satirize female vice, and naturally aimed
at high places. Dio also tells of Messalina's misdeeds, but his work is
under the same limitations as that of Suetonius. Furthermore, none but
Pliny mentions the excess under consideration.
However, "where there is much smoke there must be a little fire," and
based upon the superimposed testimony of the writers of the period, there
appears little doubt but that Messalina was a nymphomaniac, that she
prostituted herself in the public stews, naked, and with gilded nipples,
and that she did actually marry her chief adulterer, Silius, while
Claudius was absent at Ostia, and that the wedding was consummated in the
presence of a concourse of witnesses. This was "the straw that broke the
camel's back." Claudius hastened back to Rome, Silius was dispatched,
and Messalina, lacking the will-power to destroy herself, was killed when
an officer ran a sword through her abdomen, just as it appeared that
Claudius was about to relent.
"THEN SPAKE YE DAMNED WINDMILL, SIR WALTER"
Raleigh is thoroughly in character here; this observation is quite in
keeping with the general veracity of his account of his travels in
Guiana, one of the most mendacious accounts of adventure ever told.
Naturally, the scholarly researches of Westermarck have failed to
discover this people; perhaps Lady Helen might best be protected among
the Jibaros of Ecuador, where the men marry when approaching forty.
Ben Jonson in his Conversations observed "That Sr. W. Raughlye esteemed
more of fame than of conscience."
YE VIRGIN QUEENE
Grave historians have debated for centuries the pretensions of Elizabeth
to the title, "The Virgin Queen," and it is utterly impossible to dispose
of the issue in a note. However, the weight of opinion appears to be in
the negative. Many and great were the difficulties attending the
marriage of a Protestant princess in those troublous times, and Elizabeth
finally announced that she would become wedded to the English nation,
and she wore a ring in token thereof until her death. However, more or
less open liaisons with Essex and Leicester, as well as a host of lesser
courtiers, her ardent temperament, and her imperious temper, are
indications that cannot be denied in determining any estimate upon the
point in question.
Ben Jonson in his Conversations with William Drummond of Hawthornden
says,
"Queen Elizabeth never saw herself after she became old in a true glass;
they painted her, and sometymes would vermillion her nose. She had
allwayes about Christmass evens set dice that threw sixes o
r five, and
she knew not they were other, to make her win and esteame herself
fortunate. That she had a membrana on her, which made her uncapable of
man, though for her delight she tried many. At the comming over of
Monsieur, there was a French Chirurgion who took in hand to cut it, yett
fear stayed her, and his death."
It was a subject which again intrigued Clemens when he was abroad with
W. H. Fisher, whom Mark employed to "nose up" everything pertaining to
Queen Elizabeth's manly character.
"'BOCCACCIO HATH A STORY"
The author does not pay any great compliment to Raleigh's memory here.
There is no such tale in all Boccaccio. The nearest related incident
forms the subject matter of Dineo's novel (the fourth) of the First day
of the Decameron.
OLD SR. NICHOLAS THROGMORTON
The incident referred to appears to be Sir Nicholas Throgmorton's trial
for complicity in the attempt to make Lady Jane Grey Queen of England,
a charge of which he was acquitted. This so angered Queen Mary that she
imprisoned him in the Tower, and fined the jurors from one to two
thousand pounds each. Her action terrified succeeding juries, so that
Sir Nicholas's brother was condemned on no stronger evidence than that
which had failed to prevail before. While Sir Nicholas's defense may
have been brilliant, it must be admitted that the evidence was weak.
He was later released from the Tower, and under Elizabeth was one of a
group of commissioners sent by that princess into Scotland, to foment
trouble with Mary, Queen of Scots. When the attempt became known,
Elizabeth repudiated the acts of her agents, but Sir Nicholas, having
