Chapter LXXXVI: Section CCXXVIII

HISTORY OF LUXURY IN HIGHLY CIVILIZED TIMES.

The direction which luxury takes in times when civilization is advanced, is towards the real, healthy and tasteful enjoyment of life, rather than an inconvenient display. This tendency is exceedingly well expressed by the English word _comfort_, and it is in modern England that the luxury of the second period has found it happiest development. It is found side by side with frugality; and it frequently even looks like a return to the unaffected love of nature.[228-1]

Thus, since Rousseau's time,[228-2] the so-called English gardens have dropped the former Versailles-Harlem style. Thus, too, modern fashion despises the awkward long wig, powdering etc.[228-3] Instead of garments embroidered, or faced with fur or lace, and instead of the galloon hat worn under Louis XIV. and Louis XV., the French revolution has introduced the simple citizen frock-coat and the round silk hat. The "exquisite" may even with these outshine others by the form he selects, the material he wears, or by frequent change, but much less strikingly than before.[228-4] Since every one, in the purchase of household furniture, etc., looks more to its use than to the honor of being sole possessor of an article or having something in advance of everybody else, it becomes possible for industry to manufacture its products in much larger quantities, and after the same model, and thus to furnish a much better article for the same price.[228-5] Besides, more recent industry has produced a multitude of cheap substitutes for costly objects of luxury: plated silver-leafing, cotton-velvet goods, etc.;[228-6] besides the many steel engravings, lithographs etc., which have exerted so beneficent an influence on æsthetic education.

In the England of our days, the houses are comparatively small, but convenient and attractive, and the salutary luxury of spending the pleasant season in the country very general.[228-7] The country-roads are narrow but kept in excellent order and provided with good inns.[228-8] More value is here attached to fine linen cloth than to lace;[228-9] to a few but nourishing meat-dishes than to any number of sauces and confections of continental kitchens.[228-10] Especially is the luxury of cleanliness, with its morally and intellectually beneficial results found only in well-to-do and highly cultured nations. As formerly in Holland, so now in England, it is carried to the highest point of development. In the latter country, the tax on soap is considered a tax on an indispensable article.[228-11] The reverse is the case in North America, if we can believe the most unprejudiced and friendly observers.[228-12] The person who lives in a log-house must, to feel at ease within his four walls, first satisfy a number of necessary wants.[228-13]

[Footnote 228-1: The reformation of the sixteenth century
had a remarkable tendency towards natural and manful
fashions, as contradistinguished from the immediately
preceding and the immediately following periods. Compare _J.
Falke_, Deutsche Trachten und Modenwelt, II, 1858.]

[Footnote 228-2: _J. J. Rousseau_, N. Héloise, II, L. 11.
Compare _Keysler_, Reise, I, 695.]

[Footnote 228-3: That a similar transition marked an epoch
in the history of Grecian morals was recognized even by
_Thucydides_, I, 6; compare _Asios_, in _Athen._, XII, 528.]

[Footnote 228-4: It will always remain a want to own clothes
for every day wear and festal occasions. The frock coat
satisfies this want in the cheapest way. As soon as people
cease to distinguish clothing for festal occasions by the
cut, gold-embroidery, fur-facing, etc. will appear again,
which would necessarily prove a great hardship to the
propertyless classes of the educated, and even to the higher
classes.]

[Footnote 228-5: On the striking contrast presented in this
respect by the English and French, and even Russian customs,
see _Storch_, Handbuch, II, 179 ff. _J. B. Say_, Cours
pratique, translated into German by _Morstadt_, I, 435 ff.;
Deutsche Vierteljahrsschrift, 1853, I, 182.]

[Footnote 228-6: Paper-hangings, instead of costly gobelins
and leather hangings, were not known in France until after
1760, nor in the rest of Europe until much later. Busts of
plaster were (_Martial_, IX, 17, and _Juvenal_, II, 4) usual
among those who were less well off.]

[Footnote 228-7: Similarly even in _Giov. Villani_, XI, 93,
the villas of the highly cultured Florentines appear finer
than their city houses, while in Germany, at that time, even
the richest citizens lived only in the city.]

[Footnote 228-8: Sidewalks in the cities, recommended by _J.
J. Rousseau_, as a popular convenience and as a safeguard
against the carriage-aristocracy.]

[Footnote 228-9: In France, the luxury of lace was conquered
by Marie Antoinette, but still more effectually by the
Revolution. Previous to that time, many Parisians wore four
manchettes to each shirt. (_Palliser_, History of Lace,
1865.)]

[Footnote 228-10: During the middle ages, strongly seasoned
food, ragouts, etc., were more in favor than in even France
to-day; compare _Legrand d'Aussy et Roquefort_, Histoire de
la Vie priveé des Français, passim. The wine even, at that
time, used to be mixed with roots: _vin de romarin_,
_clairet_, _hippocras_, (_W. Wackernagel_, Kl. Schriften I,
86, 7.) The French kitchen became simpler and more natural,
only after the middle of the 18th century. (_Roquefort_,
III, 343.)]

[Footnote 228-11: The taxed consumption of soap amounted in
England in 1801 to 4.84 and in 1845, 9.65 pounds per capita.
(_Porter_, Progress of the Nation, V, 5, 579.) Soap-boiling
in London dates from 1520 only. Before that time, all white
soap was obtained from the continent. (_Howell_,
Londinopolis, 208.) _Erasmus_ charged that England, in his
time, was an exceedingly dirty country. The Italians, on the
other hand, were at that time greatly distinguished above
northern people, especially the Germans, by their
cleanliness. (_Buckhardt_, Kultur der Renaissance, 295.) The
Vienna river-baths after 1870, _Nicolai_, Reise, III, 17,
mentions as something deserving special note. The Leipzig
river-baths date from 1774.]

[Footnote 228-12: _Birkbeck_, Notes on America, 39. Even in
New York, it is not very long since there were no common
sewers. Just as characteristic is the uncleanliness of the
South African _boers_ (_Mauch_, in _Petermann's_
Mittheilungen, Ergänz-Heft, XXVII, 23), when compared with
the celebrated cleanliness of the old Dutch.

Americans will certainly not agree with the "friendly
and unprejudiced" observers mentioned in the text; for
no one acquainted with genuine American home-life can
deny that cleanliness is an American characteristic. It
is only justice to the author to say that the above
note (12), so far as it relates to America, appeared in
the second edition of his work, and probably in the
first; and that he is not so much to be blamed for it
as the unfriendly and prejudiced, if not ignorant
observers. It may be said, however, that, from the use
of the word "log-house," in the context, the author
does not intend to apply this remark to the older
settlements.--TRANSLATOR.]

[Footnote 228-13: The most frightful uncleanliness prevails
among the inhabitants of polar countries, who never bathe,
because of the climate, avoid all ventilation, and because
of the leathern clothing which they smear with grease, etc.
The Tunguses consider the after-birth cooked or roasted as a
great delicacy. "Fathers and mothers wipe their children's
noses with their mouth, and gulp the secretion down."
(_Georgi_, Beschreib. aller Nationen des russ. Reiches, I,
287.) Among the Koruks, the suitor rinses his mouth with his
sweetheart's water. (loc. cit., I, 349, 353.) Compare
_Klemm_, Kulturgeschichte, III, 24, 57. In warmer climates,
even less civilized nations are clean, for instance in the
East and South-Sea Islands, etc. All the more surprising is
the uncleanliness of the Hottentots and Bushmen, where the
natural color is observable only under the eyes, where the
tears produced by too much smoke has washed away the crust
of dirt which, with this exception, covers the whole body.
(_Klemm_, Kulturgeschichte, 333.) How long it takes for
cleanliness to become a national trait, may be inferred from
the history of water-closets, when, for instance, their
introduction into every house during the 16th and even the
17th century, had to be provided for by law in Paris.
(_Beckmann_, Beiträge, II, 358 ff.) The Göttingen statutes
of 1342 had to expressly prohibit persons to _merdare_ in
public wine-cellars where persons ate and drank together.
(_Spittler_, Gesch. Hannovers, I, 57.) Similarly in the
courts of the German princes. On the other hand,
universality of water-closets in England to-day.

In ancient times, too, the uncleanliness of the Spartans in
body and clothing was very surprising to the Athenians:
_Xenoph._, Resp. Laced., II, 4; _Plutarch_, Lycurg, 16.
_Just._, Lac., 5. Still more that of many barbarians, for
instance of the Illyrians: _Stobaeus_, V, 51, 132; _Gaisf.
Aelian._, V, H. IV, 1. The ancient Romans bathed only once a
week (_Seneca_, Epist., 86), while under the Empire, "the
baths embraced and filled up the whole life of man and all
his wishes." (_Gerlach._) Compare _Becker_, Gallus, II, 10
ff.; _Lamprid_, V, Comm., 11.]