594 A Dissertation on Beards, [DEC. 



future coat-collector, as rich in obsolete wardrobes as Dr. Meyrick is in 

 worn-out helms and hauberks, will hereafter worthily and successfully 

 accomplish. I will note as scientifically as I can the variations of fashion, 

 which have fallen within the sphere of my own particular profession, and 

 will thus prove to the world, that I am' myself ready to act upon the 

 exhortations which 1 have voluntarily come forward to deliver to 

 others. 



I expect to bo rejected as a contributor to the Monthly Magazine, when 

 I avow that I am nothing more than a retired pogonotomist. Yes, I, who 

 have taken, without trembling, the boldest men in this empire by the nose, 

 now faint with terror, as I confess, anonymously, to an unknown editor, 

 that, though I now make flourishes on paper, as an author, with the pen, 

 I commenced my career in life by making flourishes on beards as a barber 

 with the razor. 1 might conceal from the public the cause of so won- 

 drous a change in my avocations ; but I scorn all unnecessary disguise ; 

 and therefore declare without hesitation, that, during the speculating 

 mania which pervaded the land a few years ago, I disdained to deal any 

 longer in bubbles of soap and water. 1 forsook my business to dabble in 

 bubbles of nobler promise ; and when those bubbles burst, discovered that 

 my business, in revenge, had forsaken me. I was not, however, disheartened 

 by the discovery, because I found out, upon winding up my accounts, that 

 I had realized, by my speculations, a sum on which I could retire to a 

 spruce little cottage in the Hampstead-road, for the enjoyment of that 

 suburban repose, of which we metropolitans are so deeply enamoured. 

 After I had rusticated there some weeks in all the dignity of a new-made 

 gentleman, want of occupation converted me into a glutton of books. 

 The same cause led me, at a later period, to try my hand at concocting 

 puns for the Post, and paragraphs for the Herald; and I am now, in 

 spite of nature, and education, and early habits, become, I know not how, 

 a regular scribbler. As my thoughts, by a very natural process, often 

 recurred to the subject-matter of my past latherings, I determined that the 

 first production of my studies should be a history of the various vicissitudes 

 which have attended pogonotomy in different ages and in different coun- 

 tries, and of the savage controversies and the sanguinary wars which they 

 have occasionally excited. That production is now completed; and I 

 feel as much rapture in having brought it to a close, as Gibbon describes him- 

 self to have felt in traversing his terrace at Lausanne, after penning the last 

 sentence of his " Decline and Fall," and as Bruce may be supposed to have 

 felt, after accomplishing his journey to the previously undiscovered foun- 

 tains of the Nile. I expect, however, to be told, that my subject is not 

 worth the labour which has been bestowed upon it; and if I am so told, 

 I will not presume to gainsay the assertion. On the contrary, I will chime 

 in with every objurgation that may be directed against me for wasting 

 my time upon trifles 'Might as hair" instead of applying it to matter of 

 graver importance. I will even abstain from defending myself, by the 

 example of a thousand writers of high authority and reputation, who have, 

 each in their day, taken pride in exalting the low, and amplifying the 

 little and will suffer my reprovers to take judgment against me by 

 default, provided they will permit me, in return, to try a trick of my 

 trade upon their chins the first time they may -visit the vicinity of 

 Hampstead. If they will only vouchsafe me that honour, I will pro- 

 mise them that they shall not in a hurry stand in need of the services of 

 another barber. My revenge shall be as sharp as my razor; and if my 



