246 CUSTOMS AND MANNERS. " 



under any apprehension ; and accordingly they are decked out 

 with all the ornaments and embellishments of the fair sex. The 

 ridiculous creatures you see on the other side, as they come 

 from a distance, are content with having the head decorated 

 with jasmines and a party-colour hood, without divesting them- 

 selves of the other parts of their male attire." He had scarcely 

 concluded this explanation, when the alcaid and his attendants 

 arrived, and barred the outlets with all possible diligence. 

 Having formed a string of countesses, marchionesses, and 

 seignoras, and appropriated to themselves the refreshments 

 that had been prepared, they led them to the jail, where 

 their heads were shaven, with a view to cool them, at the 

 same time that the corroborative of a good bastinado was ap- 

 plied to the shoulders. 



Such a punishment was worthy of so monstrous an insanit}''. 

 But can any motives be assigned to exculpate this failing ? 

 Plato was of opinion, that at the beginning of the world all 

 mankind were androgyni; but that they having insulted him, 

 Jupiter divided them into two halves, man and woman ; on 

 which account the propensity of one sex for the other is so ex- 

 tremely natural. May it not likewise be said, that in many 

 men there still remain certain relics of the other sex, which 

 naturally manifest themselves ? Both consequences have the 

 same solidity and force as the arbitrary system of Plato : it is 

 certain that weak heads alone, inflated with wind, can give 

 into the mania of appearing that which they are not ; — a mania 

 which is of such antiquity, that in the time of Augustus, these 

 counterfeit hermaphrodites were met with at Rome. Horace 

 represents to us the youth Nearcus, with the hair flowing 

 gracefully on the shoulders, and perfumed with the most ex- 

 quisite 



