many inches this is confirmed by Solinus who writes that the Syrbotae of Aethiopia grew to the height of twelve feet and in another place that there was certaine people of India so great that they easily ascended Elephants Onosicrit c. 5. Onosicritus reports that in certaine places of India where there are no shadows there are men of five Cubits and two Palmes high Olaus Mag. lib. 5. cap. 2. Olaus Magnus placeth such men also in the Northerne parts and especially in the Kingdome of Helsingori which is under the command of the King of Swethland he makes mension of a Giant that was nine Cubits high Isidore confesseth that there are men to be found of twelve foot high Isidorus Etymolog l 11. c. 3. Isid lib. de rerum natur but in another Tract he delivers a strange report of an admirable procerity in these words In the Westerne parts saith he there was found a maid whom the raging waves of the sea had cast up from the Ocean unknown and wounded in the head and dead who was fifty Cubits long and between the shoulders foure Cubits broad cloathed in a purple garment which thing seemes incredible Vincent hist Nat. l. 31. c. 125. Korn ex Odoric yet some Historians of credit subscribe unto it Odoricus reports that he saw with the Great Cham a Giant of twenty foot high In former Ages to wit She-Giants Zonaras in Iustino under Iustin the Thracian a certaine woman of Cilicia appeared Giant-like both in tallnesse of body as also in proportion of the other members for she exceeded the height of the tallest men a Cubit with breasts and shoulders above the usuall manner broad all the rest as the Voice and Face and firmenesse and magnitude of her Armes and Cubits and the thicknesse of her fingers and other parts answering to her Longitude and Latitude Saint Austin hath left upon record the memoriall of a Giant-like woman St Aug. de Civitat dei c. 23. which to the great admiration of all men was seen at Rome before the City was sacked by the Goths The Author of the Book entitled De natura rerum makes mention of a remarkable stature found in the Westerne Regions such tall Viragoes were the Bradamantes Marfisa and our long Meg of Westminster but of many of these we may say they are rather mountaines of flesh than men The Question is why such men of such vast bodies and strength are not found in our daies many reasons are alleadged for it but the most rationall is the luxury and lasciviousnesse of the times which hardly suffers Nature to get any thing perfect not that there is any decay in Nature but it may well be that in these parts of the world where Luxury hath crept in with Civility there may be some diminution of strength and stature in regard of our Ancestours And here I cannot but take occasion to condole the injury done to Nature in the generative procacity to Rathe marriage used in England and elsewhere which is the cause why men be now of lesse stature than they have been before time The cause of small stature Arist polit lib. 7. cap. 16. for we observe not the rule of Aristotle in his Politiques who would have men so marry that both the man and the woman might leave procreation at one time the one to get Children the other to bring forth which would easily come to passe if the man were about eight and thirty yeares of age when he married and the woman about eighteen for the ability of getting Children in the most part of men ceaseth at seventy yeares and the possibility of conception in women commonly ceaseth about fifty so the man and the woman should have like time for generation and conception But this wholsome rule is not followed but rather the liberty of the Civill Law put in practice that the woman at twelve yeares of age and the man at fourteen are marriageable Which thing is the cause that men and women in these daies are both weake of body and small of stature yea in respect of those that lived but forty yeares ago in this Land much more then in comparison of the ancient Inhabitants of Brittaine who for their talenesse of stature were called Giants so dwarfed are we in our stature and fall short of them that that of the Poet is verified on us Terra malos homines nunc educit atque pusillos Which thing is also noted by Aristotle in the same place Est adolescentium conjunctio improba ad filiorum procreationem In cunctis enim animalibus juveniles partus imperfecti sunt Et feminae crebrius quam mares parva corporis forma gignuntur The cause of tallnesse of stature quocirca necesse est hoc idem in hominibus evenire Hujus autem conjectura fuerit quod in quibuscunque civitatibus consuetudo est adolescentes mares puellasque Conjugari in iisdem inutilia pusilla hominum corpora existunt In Florida they are not joyned in marriage untill forty yeares old Hier. Giran Cosmogr and they suckle their Children untill twelve yeares or untill they can provide for their own sustentation But if we cast our eyes abroad upon those Nations which still live according to Nature though in fashions more rude and barbarous we shall find by the relation of those that have lived among them that they much exceed us in stature still retaining as it seemes the vigorous constitution of their Predecessors which should argue that if any decay be it is not universall and consequently not naturall but rather adventitious and accidentall For proofe hereof to let passe other stories of Giants of late yeares as that which Amatus Lusitanus speakes of Amat Lusitan Curat 95. borne in Senogallia Parsons Evans the late Kings Porter c. We will content our selves with the Indies Melchior Nunnez in his Letters where he discourseth of the affaires of China reports that in the chiefe City called Paguin the Porters are fifteene foot high and in other letters written the same yeare 1555 he doth averre that the King entertaines and feeds five hundred such men for Archers of his Guard In the West Indies in the Region of Chica neare the mouth of the Streights Ortelius describes a people whom he termes Pentagones from their huge stature Nations of Giants being ordinarily of five Cubits long which make seven foot and an halfe whence their Country is known by the name of the Land of Giants Americus Vesputius who searched into the unknown parts of the world found out an Island at this day called the Island of Giants it may be them which Ortelius describes Sir Francis Drake his voyage about the world Magellane as the great Encompasser of the World observes was not altogether deceived in naming of them Giants for they generally differ from the common sort of men both in stature bignesse and strength of body as also in the
begin to be troubled with the tickling provocations of Venery they carry leaves of Trees to the quantity of Nuts all the day in either Cheeke and take them not out but when they receive meat or drink the teeth grow black with that Medicine even to the foulenesse of a quenched or dead Coale they call our men women or children in reproach because they delight in white Teeth their Teeth continue to the end of their lives and they are never pained with the Tooth-ach nor do they ever rot 'T is well they have some benefit by their affectation which very seldome happens unto any of our Artificiall Changelings They take great care of these Trees which they call Hay by reason that for the leaves thereof they get whatever wares or Commodities they like so fashionable a thing is black Teeth and in such request The Portugall and Mesticho women who live at Goa Grimston of their manners do continually eat the leaves of Beetle with Garlick and an herb called Areque the women do continually chaw of these three things like unto beasts Nations hating white Teeth and do swallow down the juyce and spit out the rest which is the cause that their Teeth grow black and red which amaze them that have not been accustomed to see them These fashions come from the Indians and these women are perswaded that they are thereby preserved from a stinking breath and from the tooth-ache and the paine in the stomack so that they would rather lose their lives than these herbs insomuch that like oxen or kine they are so used to chew the Cud that wheresoever they go or stand they must alwaies have of these leaves carried with them Lindscot li. 1. cap. 31. and the women-slaves do go alwaies chawing and are so used thereunto that they verily thinke that without it they cannot live for their common worke is to sit all day when their Husbands are out of doores behind a Mat alway chawing the herbe Beetle and they go in their houses with a dish of it in their hand being their daily chawing worke Purchas Pilgr 2. lib. 10. They in Pegu and in all the Countries of Ava Longiamnes Siam and the Bramas have their Teeth black both men and women for they say a Dog hath his Teeth white therfore they will black theirs as scorning to imitate a Canine Candor Helyn Geogr. The women of Vlna the chiefe City of Oristom or Orissa in India if Helyn remember aright in a foolish pride black their Teeth because Dogs teeth forsooth are white Lindscot li. 1. cap. 26. In Japan as among all Nations it is a good sight to see men with white Teeth it is esteemed there the filthiest thing in the world who seek by all meanes they may to make their Teeth black White Teeth vindicated for that the white causeth their griefe and the black maketh them glad In Cariajan the chiefe City of Cathai Helyn Geogr. the women use to gild their Teeth The externall uperficies of the Teeth by Nature is white terse and polished and this their native candor proves them to be bones This hue they alwaies retaine unlesse by neglect age or diseases they become red black and rotten white Teeth being so justly accounted a precious and naturall beauty that they are hence called the sale-piece For men then to affect the blemish of age and the colour of decaying sicknesse and rottenesse in their Teeth for a fashion is a very strange way of prevarication More carefull of preserving the beauty of the Teeth are the women of Sumatra who have Teeth so white that India affords none more beautifull And they of Guinea De Bay Hist Ind. Orient who have Teeth white and shining like precious Ivory which they preserve from all foulenesse by rubbing and cleansing them now and then with certaine woods which they have peculiarly for this very purpose by which friction they retaine a lustre like unto the most beautifull polished Ivory In Curiana likewise the women make their Teeth white with an herbe Lindscot li. 2. that all the day they chew in their mouths which having chewed they spit out againe and wash their mouths Had Nature afforded these Nations any such water as that Martiall speakes of which would make the Teeth of men white in like manner as it whitens Ivory Nations that file their Teeth as sharp as needles they would acknowledge themselves extraordinarily beholding unto her However commendable as serviceable to the ends of Nature are Dentifrices which the Art Cosmetique affords for preserving the Native whitenesse and integrity of the Teeth Idem Pilgr 2. lib. 9. The Macûas also file their Teeth above and below as sharp as Needles Idem eodem The black people of Caffares of the Land of Mosombique and all the Coast of Ethiopia and within the Land to the Cape of Bona Speranza some among them file their Teeth as sharpe as needles Alex. Benedict in proem li. 6. de curand morb Alexander Benedictus refused to buy an Ethiopian slave because as it were with an unhappy Omen he had all his Teeth saw-like as Dogs have The Teeth are in men of three kinds sharpe as the Fore Teeth broad as the Back Teeth which we call the Molar Teeth or Grinders and pointed Teeth or Canine These men contrary to the Law of Nature seeme to affect to have all their Teeth pointed or Canine and the saw-like Teeth of devouring Fishes Serpents and Dogs or would appeare as dangerous with their Teeth as those Creatures who have them framed like saws and closing one betweene another Pretended ends fot filling of Teeth to the no little danger of the Tongue if it should chance to fall betweene them breaking off the continuity of the range of Teeth Vnlesse we can imagine in excuse of this their unnaturall boldnesse that their Language should require such a use off the File for there are those who have caused their Teeth to be filed or shaved after a certaine manner that they might be more apt to the pronunciation of certaine Tongues which Hofman remembers to have been reported of M. John Hammers in times past professor of the Hebrew Tongue in the Academy of Ieina whence it appeares that the hard and strong substance of the Teeth is not such as some have imagined that it is impossible to subdue it by the force of Iron But Cardan acquaints us with another naturall end that they pretend unto in this businesse for Cardan lib. de subtil 12. the equall structure of the Teeth as it is most profitable to speech so it is lesse commodious for cutting for Dogs and Wolves have their Teeth unequall and disposed in manner of a Saw and these adhere and close better with one another and they retaine not so much the reliques of meat Therefore saith he certaine people of India who have not so much regard to the handsome explication of their
Senibus mandibulam Scipionis loco esse Some wiler than others in Tooth-Rites In reference unto which Physiognomers pronounce such to be short lived who have few Teeth for such prepare ill whence the first concoction hurt the second is necessarily impaired Behold here the folly and madnesse of these Nations who impoverish their mouths to enrich their fancies and discard so good servants out of the Mill of life which should grinde the Grist for the better maintenance and nourishment of the Body entertaining a defect for a fashion and that which some have decreed for a punishment and justly accounted a great Blemish For Purchas Pilgr 2. lib. 9. The Kings of Queteve were wont anciently to drinke poyson at the losse of their fore-teeth saying that a King ought to have no defect Yet a late King proclaimed it through his Kingdome that he had lost one of his fore-teeth which was fallen out that they might not be ignorant when they see him want it and would not do so but wait his naturall death holding his life necessary for to conserve his estate against his enemies and so left that patterne to Posterity Idem Pilgr 4. lib. 7. The people of the Province of Huancavilca who had killed those Masters which his Father Tupac Inca Yunangiu had sent to instruct them the Inca using his naturall clemency and to make good his Title Huacchacuijac the Benefactor of the poore he so far remitted this fault-deserving death that each Captaine and Chiefe should lose two teeth in the upper Jaw and as many in the lower both they and their descendents in memory of not satisfying their promise made to his Father whereupon the whole Nation would needs participate both men and women Artificiall Teeth prefer'd before the naturall in that Tooth-losse and did likewise use this Tooth-rite to their Sons and Daughters as if it had been a favour So that what was intended for punishment grew thereupon to be a fashion And this I suppose to be the originall of the Custome or Tooth-rite mentioned before in this Scene of the Guancavilcae in Peru although it be variously reported and it may be a little mistaken In Java Island there are few to be found that have their native Teeth For the most of them Schenckius li. observat de Dentibus both men and women either cause them to be pulled out or filed down with a File and others to be set in their place of Gold or Silver Steele or Iron made to succeed in their rooms Had these men such a fountaine as there is in Persia which makes their Teeth fall out that drinke of it they would be well contented which since they have not Tooth-drawers and Tooth-setting Chirurgions would have a good Trade there where men and women are so ungratefull and villanously bent against the goodnesse of Nature as to prefer Artificiall Teeth before the Naturall Aesculapius was the first who in case of necessity and paine invented the drawing out of aking Teeth and therefore had a leaden Daviser consecrated unto him But these people out of wantonnesse and a foolish bravery put themselves to losse and paine the Teeth especially the Eye-Teeth being bred with paine and not pulled out without paine and danger And if they cut or file them down they expose themselves to as great a mischiefe by reason of that hollow part of the Teeth which is sensible into which the soft Nerves enter as it fared with a certaine Monke at Patavia Renovation of Teeth who when he came to have a tooth which was longer than the rest cut to cure the deformity it brought fell straight way into a convulsion and Epilepticall fits and in the part of the Tooth cut off there appeared the footsteps of a Nerve more thankfull to Nature and more retentive of her benefits are they of Fez where when a Child begins to have his Teeth grow his Parents make a feast for other Children and they terme this feast Dentilla which is a proper Latin word And when rotten Teeth are drawn out it is convenient to thinke of some way of artificiall reparation Paraeus heard it reported by a credible person that he saw a Lady of the prime Nobility who instead of a rotten Tooth she drew made a sound Tooth drawn from one her waiting maid at the same time to be substituted and inserted which Tooth in processe of time as it were taking root grew so firme as that she could chaw upon it as upon any of the rest but he had this but upon heresay And the Teeth are so necessary to the welfare of the body of man that Nature to some especiall Favorites hath afforded a renovation of Teeth in their old age nay even of their very Grinders very many examples of which indulgency you may find in Schenckius Lord Bacon and Aldrovandus and of the Countess of Desmond it is reported that she did dentire twice or thrice casting her old Teeth and others comming in their place which is one instance that gives some likelihood of that great designe of restoring Teeth in age which yet hath not been known to have been provoked by Art Lord Bacons Nat. Hist Cent 8. yet my Lord Bacon makes a Quere whether children may not have some wash or something to make their Teeth better and stronger Corall is in use as an help to the Teeth of Children Golden Teeth In the Province of Cardandam under the great Can Tarters Jurisdiction the men and women cover their Teeth with thin Plates of Gold which they so fit unto them that the Teeth themselves seeme as it were to be set in Plate Had Nature furnished these Nations with a set of such golden Teeth as the Silesian Boy had which answered the Touch and so exercised the wits of the Physicians of that Age she had fitted their Fancies to a haire and had prevented this artificiall endeavour though indeed that proved but a trick of Art To be born with Teeth or in extreame old age to have Teeth renew againe of both which there are many examples are rather miracles in Nature than Monstrosities but the redundant force of Nature is more remarkable in those who have had a double row of Teeth Val. Max. lib. 1. cap. 6. Plin. Nat. Hist lib. 11. cap. 38. Colsius lib. 4. cap. 3. G. Bauhin de observ propriis Colum. lib. 1. Anat. cap. 10. Plin. li. 7. c. 16. Val. Max li. 1. de mirac ca. 8. Solin cap. 9. Fulg. lib. 1. c. 6. Plut. in Pyrrhe as Direpsima the Daughter of Mithridates had Timarchus the Son of Mestor Cyprius and a boy of Lutesia who had all a double course of Teeth Jon Chius attributes to Hercules a trebble set of Teeth which is not so wonderfull since Columbus reports of a Boy of his called Phoebus whose mouth was so stored Some also have had one intire whole bone that tooke up all the Gumbe instead of a row of distinct
painted red with the root Pocone brayed to powder mixed with oyle which Scarlet-like colour makes an exceeding handsome shew and is used by the Kings Concubines this they hold in Summer to preserve them from the heat and in Winter from the cold Many other formes of painting they use but he is the most Gallant that is the most monstrous to behold Their Children of whom they are easily delivered and yet love them dearely to make them hardy in the coldest mornings they make them wash in the Rivers and by painting and ointments so tann their skins that after a yeare or two no weather will hurt them when they enter into battell they paint and disguise themselves in the fiercest manner they can devise After their ordinary burials are ended the women having painted all their Faces with black coale and oile do sit 24 houres in their houses mourning and lamenting by turnes with such yelling and howling as may expresse their great passions the Faces of all their Priests are painted as ugly as they can devise Sometimes the men appeare halfe black and halfe red Face-grimers but all their Eyes painted white and some red stroakes like Mustachoes along their Cheeks Some of them paint their Eyes red having white stroakes over their black Faces so that they look more like devils than men Captaine Smith about Onawniament encountred with Ambushcadoes of such Savages so strangely painted grimed and disguised shouting yelling and crying as so many spirits from Hell could not have shewed more terrible Johan Bohem. de moribus gen lib. 3. Somewhat allyed to this barbarous way of Disguise is the Custome of the Germans who are said once a yeare to run mad covering their Faces with Vizards belying their Sex and Age some of them willing rather to represent Satyrs or Divels paint themselves with Vermilion or Inke deforming themselves with such nefarious habits others running naked play the Lupercalls from whom my Author thinks this annuall Custome of raving was first derived who naked and with their faces defiled in bloud wandring through the City were wont to strike every one they met with thongs of leather The Author of the Description of Nova Francia lib. 2. The Souriquois do paint their Faces all with black which maketh them seeme very hideous but this is their mourning Visage Ramutius narration of Nova Francia The women of New France about the Port of the holy Crosse for the death of their Husbands weare a certaine black weed all the daies of their life besmearing all their Faces with coale dust and grease mingled together almost halfe a quarter of an Intch thick and by that they are known to be Widdows Painting being Universall Face-daubers and without exception among the West Indians The Author of the Description of Nova Francia lib. â— for if any of them maketh Love he shall be painted with red or blue colour and his Mistris also If they be glad at any thing they will do the like generally which is their expression of jolly bravery But when they are sad or plot some Treason then they overcast all their Face with black and are hideously deformed In Persia the womens pale colour is made sanguine by adulterate complexion Herberts Travels and their round cheeks are fat and painted The common womens cheeks are of a delicate dye but Art not Nature causeth it The Grecian women for the most part Sandys Travels lib. 1. are brown of complexion but exceedingly well favoured they cover not their Faces the Virgins excepted unlesse it be with painting using all the supplement of a sophisticated beauty And not without cause for when they grow old the most grow contemptible being put to the drudgery of the house and many times to wait on their Children The Spanish women when they are married Howel Epist Famil they have a priviledge to weare high Shooes and to paint which is generally practised there and the Queen useth it her selfe which brings on a great decay in the naturall Face For it is observed that women in England look as youthfull at fifty as some there at twenty five This saith Munster Munst Cosm lib. 2. is to be reproved in your Spanish women that they now and then deforme their face with washes of Vermilion Ceruse because they have lesse native colour than your French women Artificial Faire Ones and indeed other nations learnt from them the use of Spanish paper The Ladies of Italy not to speake of the Curtezans to seeme fairer than the rest take a pride to besmeare and paint themselves A Geographer speaking of Venice saith that it is thought no one City againe is able to compare with that City for the number of gorgeous Dames as for their beauty of face though they be faire indeed I would not willingly commend them because there is in a manner none old or young unpainted It is observed that the Roman Dames had infinite little boxes filled with loathsome trash of sundry kind of colours and compositions for the hiding of their deformities the very sight and smell whereof was able to turne a mans stomack Ovid. de medic fac Pixides invenies rerum mille colores Non semel hinc stomacho nausea facta meo And for the face used so much slibber-sauce such daubing and painting that a man could not well tell facies dicatur an ulcus May it a Face or a Botch be call'd Johan Bohem. de moribus gen lib. 3. The ancient English stained their Faces with Woad which is of a blew or sky colour that they might appeare more horrid to their enemies in fight Our English Ladies who seeme to have borrowed some of their Cosmeticall conceits from Barbarous Nations Spotted Faces affected are seldome known to be contented with a Face of Gods making for they are either adding detracting or altering continually having many Fucusses in readinesse for the same purpose Sometimes they think they have too much colour then they use Art to make them look pale and faire Now they have too little colour then Spanish paper Red Leather or other Cosmeticall Rubriques must be had Yet for all this it may be the skins of their Faces do not please them off they go with Mercury water and so they remaine like peeld Ewes untill their Faces have recovered a new Epidermis This is as odious and as senselesse an affectation as ever was used by any barbarous Nation in the World And I doubt our Ladies that use them are not well advised of the effect they worke for these spots in Faire Faces advantage not beauty as they suppose Black patches no advantage to Beauty because contraries compared and placed neare one another shew their lustre more plainely but because it gives envy satisfaction which takes pleasure in defects or by reason it takes away that astonishment which instead of delighting confounds not that Imperfection can make perfect or that the defect
have seen men with Necks of a Cubit long the other parts of their body being proportionable thereunto In Eripia as some write or according to Lycosthenes in the extreame part of Siricana or as it pleaseth others in some of the Valleys of Tartaria there harbours a Nation of so long a Neck that it wholly resembles the neck of a Crane afterwards in the top of the Neck there is a ferine Face Long gangrell necks inconvâ—nient with the Eyes and Nostrils of a man as also with a bill adorned with Gils like a Cock Aldrovandus indeed saies it will more availe one to read than believe this Relation yet he denies not but there are halfe-men with a long Neck and a ferine Face do live in those Regions their women being not so deformed as the men and they are said to be very seldome seen This Nation is carried with great force against their Enemies and chiefly against the Tartars Aldrovandus hath exhibited the Effigies of these Gangrell-Neck'd men to be considered of by his Readers Aldrov monst Hist lib. 1. which puts me in mind of that ridiculous wish of Philoxones that grumbled at Nature for the shortnesse of his Neck who would have had the Neck of a Crane that thereby he might have taken more pleasure in his meat or as some thinke to obtaine advantage in singing or warbling and dividing the notes in Musick which Cavill of Philoxones against Nature for not having respect unto the Taste or singing in the contrivance of his Neck is absurd and in the very foundation of the fancy to be condemned D. Brown Pâ—â—udodoxia Epid. lib. 7. cap. 14. as it is ingeniously observed by the late Enquirer into vulgar errours And if he had obtained this foolish request yet the justnesse of Nature could not have suffered him to have been a gainer by the bargaine for a long gangrell neck which would have made the head look as set upon a pole would by such an elongation caused a very inconvenient distance between the braine and the heart but the Epicure surely had a more reaching conceit Nations that have no Neck knowing that they are more greedy of meat and have better stomacks who have a greater space from the mouth to the paunch They that inhabit those Alpes which divide France from Italy their throats are encreased to that bulke and largenesse that both in men and women those gutturall bottles hang down even to their Navels and they can cast them over their shoulders and this is not commonly seen in the Allobroges Carinthians Syrians and Nations living about the Alpes but it is also familiar to some places of Spaine Fabricius ab Aqua pend Fabricius saith that such Tumours are frequent among the Bergomensians where the men and women all for the most part have such great pendent bags in the fore-part of their Throats Joan. Stumpf. lib. Chr. 10. cap. 20. Among the Rucantians a people of Helvetia now called Rhaeti the Inhabitants especially about the Town Ciceres are troubled with the same gutturall deformity M. Pol. lib. 1. cap. 31. Neither doth this happen only in Europe but also in Asia for the men there have such great wallets of flesh after a wonderfull manner hanging at their throats But in Syria the women have their throats so protended that they cast it behind their back as it were a Sack or Wallet Ortel in Illyrico lest it should hinder their Infants when they suck This swelling or Throat-Dropsie The cause of swelling throats is occasioned by the drinking of crude waters of dissolved Snow as most Authors suppose which although it be a reason not to be rejected Platerus yet Platerus to this Cause addes the Seed and the Facultie Formatrix in the wombe where they are familiar to any place and that they are rather propagated from the Parents in their Children then that they happen by reason of any meat or drinke or any other peculiar cause which Sennertus thinkes doth not seldome fall out so indeed yet the first cause seemes valid because it is observed that they that come well into any such places after they have abode there a while they contract such a water between the skin and rough Artery which is called by Physitians Bronchocele and Bocium à Bocii ventricosi poculi similitudine from the similitude of a great-bellied drinking Cup. Shoulders higher than the Head SCENE XVII Humerall or Shoulder-Affectations Lycost Append Chron. prodig IN the Island Taprobana High huff-Shoulders are in Fashion and Naturall Whether these Nations are guilty or not of using Art to this purpose I shall not conclude although I halfe suspect some concurrent affectations My apprehension of this businesse I have already exprest in the History of the Acephali which appeare to be the same Nation In all the parts of Tartaria the men are broad-shouldered which being Nationall is held there in good repute And if it were not at first affected and introduced among them by Art Broad shoulders where affected yet in other Countries where it is noted to be extremely affected there hath been some endeavour used to that intent and where that hath failed they have had recourse to outward supplements Concerning the Italians Cresol vacat Autumn Cresollius hath informed us of their ridiculous affectation in this kind Behold saith he what the improvident curiosity of men hath thought on who that they might seeme Plato's that is broad-shouldred full square and somewhat strong and mighty men they bumbast their Doublets and after a childish or rather womanish manner adhibent Analectides use little Bolsters or Pillows for to seeme more fat and comly bolstring so up their prominent shoulders as little women were wont to do of old as Ovid describes the Custome Conveniunt tenues scapulis Analectides altis Angustum circa fascia pectus erat Well could these men be Masters of their wish yet it is a question whether it would please their Mistrisses For the women of other Countries and among us are not so well affected to broad shoulders for it is worth the noting what women by long use have observed to wit that men that have broad shoulders for the most part get great Children Hence the Mother-in-Law of Forestus a fruitfull woman would not match her Daughters to Platonique men by reason she feared least in their Delivery they should be endangered by reason of the greatnesse of the Child which Forestus had often seene to happen the broad shoulders dangerously sticking in the Birth Narrow shoulders affected the cause whereof Riolanus thinks to be difficult whence you may see what worke they make for the women who endeavour by Art to purchase thick and broad shoulders Franciscus Hernandus in his Manuscript makes report of certaine Nations in India who are all buncht-backt crooked and crump-shouldered Arme-gallanry SCENE XVIII Strange Inventions of certain Nations in ordering their Armes Hands and Nailes The
the Midwife presents a sleepy Opiate potion during the operation whereof the Bell is loosed from the flesh and fastened to the Foreskin which hinders not but titilates A description of these Yard-balls the Unguent is applied and the cure is perfected I beleeve the report of these Bells of Siam will ring like a loud lye and the yard Tennis-Balls keep a vile racket in mens imaginations and ere Reason hath plaid out the Game will be struck into the hazzard of incredulity yet beyond expectation I have met with a kind of ocular assurance in this businesse which I owe to the courtesie of an ingenious Physitian who knowing my Designe freely offered to contribute to the curiosity thereof I would all knowing men were of his intellectuall Constitution and had the right gallant temper of a Platonique Spirit to communicate and advance Notiall Ideas This noble Doctor I say procured me one of these Balls which a friend of his brought from Pegu when he delivered it unto me we both wondred at the unexpected size and weight thereof for it was a little bigger than a musket bullet being about an Inch in Diameter the metall is of such a temper which we know not it is two parts Gold and one Brasse perfectly round and yielding a very sweet sound far beyond any of our hand Symbals which this somewhat resembles and the hissing melody thereof makes me to thinke that it is an Adders dried Tongue that is within it according as Historians report but the containing Concave being close and not open as our little Bels our curiosity would have spoiled the instrument with a forced inspection the Gentleman that brought it over informes us that they use there to put three or foure of them in between the Glans and the praeputium and they remaine fast there without slipping out who can sufficiently admire that any member should officiate clogged with such weight or that they should find stable roome for it A restraint of Sodomy and yet Travellers have discovered the waies of an artificiall Capacity Surely the men exceed not only us but them of Ginne in the largenesse of this Organ or else they must needs suffer much by such a dolorous extension of the praepuce as this fond fashion will necessarily occasion Whether O whether and to what prodigious extremities doth the abused phantasie of man sometimes drive him Among all the Inventions that he ere found out this would appeare most mad and filthy if it had been meerly for Ornament Musique or Delight but my zeale for the honesty of Nature is somewhat tempered with patience when I find that the originall of this contrivance was because they should not abuse the Male Sex for in times past all the Country was so given to that villany that they were scarce of people And therefore a Queen Rectrix imposed the wearing of those Balls upon them in way of restraint But as for the other part of their Queens ordinance it no way stands with the honesty of Nature who the better to allure men from Sodomy ordained that the women should weare but three Cubits of cloath in their Smocks which they weare with three braces which is therefore so streight that they cannot go but they must shew their secrets as 't were aloft and in their going they feigne to hide it with their hand but cannot by reason of the straightnesse of the cloath for they are so covered as another observes Herberts Travels that a base device 't is made to open as they go so as any impure aire gives all to mens immodest eye denudating those parts which every modest eye most scornes each honest thought most hates to see and thinke upon Which thing it seemes was invented by a Queene to be an occasion that the sight thereof might remove from men that vice against Nature Absurd projects of women to gaine regard which they were greatly given unto which sight should cause them to regard Women the more Yet they of the Kingdome of Benni are it seems Purch Pilgr 2. lib. 7. of another opinion concerning the effect of this Invention for there men and women are not ashamed to shew themselves one unto another as they themselves affirme and by reason prove saying that a man more coveteth and desireth a thing that he seeth not or may not have then that he seeth and may borrow and have and for that cause they hide not their privy members And all those Spaniards Portugals Frenchmen Flemmings and English-men that have been conversant in those parts have affirmed that their manner of going naked is neither fightly nor pleasing and that nothing makes a woman more despised and contemned than to behold her ordinarily naked Wherefore they are not to be imitated that so freely discover their parts of shame only thereby to gaine husbands Nor the Africans Indians Caribes or Brasileans who go naked not for ostentation but by custome either in regard of the Countries great heat or by not being acquainted with the use of Garments but rather we ought to cloathe and conceale those parts which Nature her selfe hath placed so far off both from the sight of our selves and others And indeed although it may seeme to be a bait and provocation to lust and lasciviousnesse yet experience shews the contrary for that splendid apparell The Art of Infibulation of the prepuce counterfeit crisped haire is more discommendable than the nakednesse of these Barbarians which might be made good by many reasons Our first Parents after their sin were justly ashamed seeing their nakednesse And we detest the Heresie which violating the Law of Nature not in this point sufficiently observed by our Adamites endeavours to bring in this shamefull Custome Yet we are neverthelesse to be condemned for condemning them for going naked since we offend in the contrary with too much decking our bodies And would we could regard more modesty and necessity of habits and use them rather for honesty than to pride and vanitie which is more hurtfull than their nakednesse Among the Ancients to prevent young effeminate Inamorato's especially Comedians from untimely Venery and cracking their voices they were wont to fasten a Ring or Buckle on the Foreskin of their Yard as Celsus reports and hereto Martiall seemes to allude in that place Mart. Epigr. where he saies Dum ludit mediâ populo spectante Palestrâ Heu cecidit misero fibula verpus erat Juvenal Satyr A practice also noted by the Satyrist Solvitur his magno Comeodi fibula The Patagons a Race of Giants Purch Pilgr 1. lib. 2. in the fortieth Degree of the South Pole trusse their Genitall members so as it is hidden within their body Which is a transgression against the morall Law of Nature established in our members Nature having excluded these parts from out the Continent of the body for the better moderating of Concupiscence They in the Bay of Soldania have but one stone naturally
prius locum Men whose members hang down to their shanks sed caute procedendum ne nimis trahant vel nimis calefaciant qui nutrimentum attractum resolveret volentes membrum magnificare minus ipsum efficerent sicut nimius motus frigiditatem inducit moderatus calorem Eadem res effectos oppositos producit Nimia ergo attractio nimia loci calefactio resolvit dum magnificare quaeritis parvitatem efficietis moderata autem attractione facietis magnitudinem Ars etiam est curativa de elonganda mentula cum pondere plumbeo The Floridians so love the Feminine Sex The Author of the Descrip of Nova Francia lib. 2. that for to please them the more they busie themselves very much about that which is the primary signe of uncleane desires and that they may the better do it they furnish themselves with Ambergreece whereof they have great store which first they melt at the fire then inject it with such paine that it maketh them to gnash their Teeth even so far as to the Os sacrum and with a whip of Nettles or such like thing make that Idoll of Maacha to swell on the other side the women use certaine herbs and endeavour themselves as much as they can to make restrictions for the use of the said Ityphalles and to give either party their due Nescio an revera constat quod diverbio fertur Arvum Genitale in mulieribus Belgicis altiorem in pube scituationem obtinere sed Medicus quidam ex observatione propria mihi communicata affirmat Genitalia in viris Hybernicis alliora in pube apparere In the Isle of Hermes the mens members hang down to their shanks Sr Joh. Mand. Travels cap 53. insomuch that the men of that Country who knew better manners do bind them streight Pygmaei magno veretro and annoint them with ointments made there for to hold them up wherby they may live more civilly which is supposed to be by reason of the heat of the climate dissolving the body Ctesias Indicus Ionst Thaumatograph Ctesias saith that the Negro Pigmies who dwell in the midst of India who are saddle-nosed and deformed have a veretrum so great and long that it hangs down even unto their Ankles Hinc de Nanis Pygmaeis quaerendum cur majorem penem habeant An quia ut scripsit Aristoteles quemadmodum homo non habens caudam illa materia in nates conversa sit similiter materia quae augmentaioni staturae Nani non est famulata in penem transmutata sit But concerning these and other strange corporall properties of Nations mentioned in this book Quaere Card. Comment in Hip. li. de Aere Aquis locis I wish some Commentator on Hippocrates Book De Aere Aquis locis would arise who supplying the losse of the much desired Comment of Galen upon that Booke might render some account of these matters What Cardan in his Comment upon that Book hath done I can give no account having never after much enquiry had the hap to meet with it That women have been metamorphosed into men is not only confirmed by Pliny and the credit of other ancient Authors but of later times many examples are to be found very evident in moderne Writers Skenck observ med lib. 4. Korn de mirac vivorum fol. 41 Marc. Donat. med Hist mirab Tulp observ Delrio Inquisit Mag. Iordanus and for all that I perceive there are few that are willing to have it accounted a Fable And the conceit is grounded upon the Authorities of Aristotle and Galen which Anatomists little approve of which is that Nature alwaies intends the Generation of the Male but if she erre from her scope and cannot generate a Male then bringeth she forth the Female Women no monster which is the first and most simple imperfection of a Male which therefore they call a Creature lame occasionall and accessory as if she were not of the maine but made by the bye concluding the Woman or Female to be nothing else but an errour or aberration of Nature which the Peripatetiques call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by a Metaphor taken from Travellers which misse of their way and yet at length attaine their journies end yea they proceed further and say that the Female is a by-worke or prevarication yea the first monster in Nature which is unworthily said of them for the perfection of all naturall things is to be esteemed and measured by the end Now it is necessary that the woman should be so formed or else Nature must have missed of her scope because she intended a perfect Generation which without a woman cannot be accomplished But now it is to be enquired how in terminis naturalibus it can be done that women should be turned into men as the infinite examples of such Cases seeme to prove which since it is monstrous we must have recourse to the causes of Monsters which happen by the errour of Nature occasioned either through the disobedience of matter or debility of the Agent and therefore they properly and modestly enough define a Monster to be a certaine oblaesion of Nature And that it is monstrous for women to be turned into men is apparent by Aristotles Definition for that is monstrous which is besides Nature to wit that Nature which for the most part is for besides that which alwaies and necessary is nothing is done therefore Monstrosity happens when any thing besides Nature appeares in those things which for the most part are so done How women are turned into men but may also be done otherwise wherefore since it is against the order of Humane Nature that a woman should degenerate into a man yet notwithstanding it being not impossible that we call monstrous and it hath the same cause which other Monsters according to Quality Number Magnitude or Scituation of Members wherefore for this reason the Learned reduce the cause of this Humane Metamorphosis to the errour of the virtue Agent and the aptitude of superfluous matter If this happened while every Animall existed in Generation it would cleare all doubts But since it is done when the Animall is borne how the virtue Formatrix can effect it is not easie to explaine but seemes a great Difficulty Therefore Anatomists and Physitians say that the virile member in such women was from the first ingenite the Agent virtue working on superfluous matter that forme upon it but by such a Law of Nature that it cannot come forth untill such a determinate time which ought not to seeme impossible to any man since we see in Embrions even in the mothers wombe Teeth formed and yet lie hid until the appointed time of their extramission which is very true and known by ocular Faith from the dissections of Abortives and Infants new-born Barth Eustachius de dentibus libello cap. 15. 17 c. as many Anatomists affirme Therefore even as all Teeth have their beginning
of Generation in the mothers wombe yet are concealed nor come out perfect but in progresse of time which yet is not definite and the same with all What then should hinder but that in a woman a virile member made in the first formation should in appointed Tract of time come forth perfect and be made manifest but that this change by extrusion of inbred or inverted members should happen after the time of Child-birth That women cannot be transformed into men exceeds all possibility of beliefe Pontan lib. 10. de reb Coelest yet Pontanus beares witnesse of a woman who after she had borne a son attained by a wonderfull change unto the virile Sex which be confirmes by the testimony of Antonius Colotius Umbrus That Men should be transformed into Women is more rare it having been no where ere found that a Male degenerated into a Female Nature abhorring such a perverse regresse from more perfect to lesse Indeed Licinius Mutianus reporteth Cited by Plin. Nat. Hist l. 7. that he saw at Smyrna a Boy changed into a Girle but I thinke Philosophers will no more regard his report than they do the Fictions of Poets who have made descriptions of such a needlesse Metamorphosis Herodotus in Thalia As for that which Herodotus delivers concerning the men of Scythia evirated and changed into a Feminine estate it is not to be understood that the Masculine Sex was truly changed into the Feminine but he speakes of a kind of disease which we elsewhere shall have an occasion to touch at for men then to lose the appearance of their Virilities and to have those parts translated into the apparance of the other Sex is a thing not only rare but impossible in Nature unlesse we will imagine that the Female Patriarch of Greece and Pope Joane of Rome were the Subjects of such Metamorphosis Nero indeed whom nothing in the ordinary course of Nature would satisfie by a most prodigious conceit attempted to make such a Monster by Art and would needs have a Boy of his called Sporus cut and made forsooth a woman to whom he was solemnly married which occasioned some justly to say that it had been happy for the Common-wealth if Domitius his Father had had no other but such a wife and verily none but such a Monster of Men could have endeavoured so absurd a Transfiguration of Man Nero's absurd attempt to make a woman of a man That the Devill furnished with naturall Causes may by Divine permission cause some apparant change of Sexes is not doubted of by the Learned yet he can no way by the Nature of things convert a Man into a woman much lesse could Nero do it who is called by Jordanus Bipedum nequissimus the wickedest man that ere went upon two Legs SCENE XXII Tailed Nations Tailed Nations Breech-Gallantry and Abusers of that part THere is not a living Creature excepting Men and Apes but is furnished with a Taile for the necessary use of their Bodies The reason why man wants a Taile is rendred by Aristotle Arist de part Animâ—l lib. 4. for that the aliment that should go to the Taile was spent upon his Buttocks Thighs and Legs which are more fleshy and full than the parts that answer them in other Creatures and there was no necessity of a Taile in man since his Buttocks with their Corpulency afford a sufficient covering But the chiefe Cause of this difference is the upright stature of man which is his peculiar Prerogative the Ape his counterfeit as a two-legged Animal wants a Tail and as a foure-footed he hath no Buttocks But although Man naturally wants a Taile yet Pausanias reports of Nations that were furnished with Tailes Neither is the report of our Kentish Long-tailes a meere Fable for besides the Records of our English Chronicles Kentish Long-tailes there are divers Authors that have registred the Originall of this Monstrosity Neiremb lib. 1. de mirac Naturae in Europ Joan. Major lib. 2. de gest is Scotor cap. 9. Guliel Nang Genebâ— in Greg. M. Korn de vivorum mirac whose Relations amount to this effect When Augustine the Monke being sent from Gregory the Great came to preach the Gospell unto the English Nation at Rochester the Vulgar in derision of the Holy man pin'd fishes tailes upon his Garment or as some say threw them at him whereupon Augustine prayed to God that their Children might be borne with Tailes and it pleased God to confirme his Doctrine by inflicting this punishment upon the Posterity of that incredulous people so that these Kentish Long-tailes proceeded not from the influence of Heaven but from a miracle And although Antonius Neirembergensis thinkes that this punishment endured but for a time and that this Miracle is now ceased yet I am informed by an ingenious and honest Gentleman of good worth who professed that he had read in some of our Chronicles or other Author whose name he could not very well remember that there is at this day a Family in Kent who have to Surname the name of a Village very neare Rochester whereof all that are descended have a Taile insomuch that you may know any one to be rightly descended of that Family by having a Taile Yet I must suspect some failing in my friends memory Delrio disquis Mag. Polydor. Virgil. Hist Angl. lib. 13. because I find in Delrio his disquisition of Magick that the originall of the Kentish Long-tailes was after this manner Thomas Becket Arch-Bishop of Canterbury being in disgrace with Henry the Second and riding through Stroud neare Rochester the Inhabitants to put an affront upon him cut off his Horses Taile Irish Long-tailes which ever since was entailed upon them insomuch as you may know a man of Stroud by his long Taile And to make it a little more credible that the Rump-bone among bruitish and strong-dockt Nations doth often sprout out with such an excrescence or beastly emanation I am informed by an honest young man of Captaine Morris Company in Lieutenant Generall Iretons Regiment that at Cashell in the County of Tipperary in the Province of Munster in Carrick Patrick Church seated on a hill or rock stormed by the Lord Inchequine and where there were neare seven hundred put to the sword and none saved but the Mayors Wife and his Son there were found among the slaine of the Irish when they were stripped divers that had Tailes neare a quarter of a yard long the Relator being very diffident of the truth of this Story after enquiry was ensured of the certainty thereof by forty Souldiers that testified upon their oaths that they were eye-witnesses being present at the Action It is reported also Teste Euseb Iesuita that in Spaine there is another such tailed Nation But that which gives great reputation to the Narratives of Tailed Nations Anton. Nelremb Nat. Hist Dr Harvey lib. de Generat is a History we have gained by the Coryphaeus of
long legs broad feet and long toes The Men of Aegypt and Ethiopia have their feet crooked St Austin makes mention of Men borne at Hippo with feet fashioned like a halfe moon Aug. lib. 16. de Civit. Dei c. 8. with two Toes in each foot Many of Canton and Quamsi Province have two nailes upon their little toes as they have generally in Cachin China Concerning these and some other properties of Natitions where I suspect no Artifice I am willing to say with Pliny That no wonder it is that about these Coasts Plin. Nat. Hist lib. 6. there be found men and beasts of strange and wondrous shapes considering the agility of the Suns fierie heat so strong and powerfull in those Countries which is able to frame Bodies artificially of sundry proportions and to imprint and grave in them divers formes Concerning these Monsters which have scarce the Figure of any certaine Species and either are not humane S. Aug Enchir. cap. 87. Epist ad vitalem lib. 22. de Civit. Dei vid. c. 19. Bonavent l. 4. Dist 44. or partly humane and partly mixt of divers S. Augustine with whom Lumbard agrees denies they shall rise againe or we are not saith he to believe they shall appeare so vitiated in the Resurrection but rather with a corrected and amended nature Where they paint their Feet and their deformity be it of what kind soever recalled to the true Figure of a humane Fabrick not that there shall any thing perish in the Body which was naturally in it but only that which is deformed God doing that which an Artificer is wont who can dissolve againe with fire a deformed Statue whether it were made so on purpose or by chance and the errour of Art and introduce a more beautifull Figure So that the same substance shall remaine the first deformity abolished for what was extant expressed or wanting of featnesse to that foule Figure that he either cuts off or fils up or adds that the dishonesty filthinesse ill favourednesse or horriblenesse thereof may be removed In like manner we may suppose it will be done in the Resurrection for these monstrous deformities cannot consist with the future felicity of the Saints the manner of restitution we must leave to the Creator But as for the deformed members of wicked men which were polluted with sin and made the Instruments of iniquity there is no reason why this should be common with them with Innocents and the heires of that life but as the bodies of the damned shall be tormented De his vide Thom. Aquin. 4. Con. gentiles cap. 89. Purch Pilgr 2. lib. 9. so they shall suffer with their deformities yet there is no certainty since nothing is expressely revealed in Scripture of this matter In Candou Island they have a custome to make the Nailes of their Feet red this is the beauty of that Country they make it with the juyce and moisture of a certaine Tree and it endures as long as the Nailes Idem lib. 7. The Abassines also colour their Feet which are bare with the juice of a reddish-barke The Virgins among the Chiribichenses use to wrap the parts of the Calfes of their Legs and Thighs next the Knees with Bottoms of yarne Where they affect great Hips and Thighs Pet. Martyr Decad. 8. and bind them hard to the end that their Calfes and Legs might swell bigger and through this foolish device they thinke they appeare finer to their Lovers their other parts are naked The Cathayans also as it seemes The Authour of the Treasury of Times vol. 1. lib. 3. cap. 5. have the same foolish affectation among them This Nation seemes to be of an opinion somewhat contrary to Momus who misliked the fashion of the Leg of man that the belly thereof or the Calfe which was seated behind in a place out of danger was furnished so with a defence of flesh and the shin-bone exposed to all encounters without any defence at all never noting that the Eyes were placed before to secure the Shins whereas there was none behind to looke to the safety of the Calfe But one would think they were aware of that notion of Physiognomy which pronounceth spine Legs almost destitute of flesh to be an argument of one prompt to venery Men with one Calfe of their Leg bigger than the other as being a sign of a libidinous Nature A fault commonly noted in women for those whose Legs or shankes are leane and have little flesh they call them leacherous and shamefull whores like unto Goates of which this cause may perchance be assigned for that the aliment is retained in the upper parts and passeth into Seed and spirits whereupon the Legs become small and leane which is manifest in them who want a foot or by any other way become lame for to those lower parts the aliment is not transmitted so copiously as before all which persons are therefore very leacherous There was a Calfe-swelling punishment inflicted upon those of Meliopore Herberts Travels Helyn Geogr. both men and women for their cruell ingratitude to St Thomas martyred by them Neirembergensis cals them a peculiar Nation among the Mallabars which from a place of S. Thomas have their name and called Pencays and questions whether it be to be imputed to Nature or a Miracle And on the Tribe of Benjamin who were most fierce against our Saviour both which to this day have one leg as big again in the Calfe as the other this doubled upon them in this humour would have been kindly accepted and entertained for a fashion Yet insome parts of America it should seem they have a contrary affectation at least if I understand Appianus rightly where he saith Aetr. Appian 2. pars Cosmog cap. 4. de America Sanguinem quoque in Lumbis Tibiarum pulpis comminuunt Most free from any affectation in that part are Neatherland women who are well proportioned especially in their Legs and Feet Men and Women only have Calves in their Legs and their Legs full of flesh howbeit Pliny saies he hath read in some writers that there was one man in Aegypt had no Calfe at all to his Legs A Crane-leg'd man but was legged like a Crane Torquato Tasso in the comparison he maketh between Italy and France reported to have noted that the French commonly have more spiny and slender Legs than the Italian Gentlemen and he imputeth the cause to the French-mens continuall riding and sitting on Horseback which is the very same from which Suetonius draweth another cleane contrary conclusion for he saith Germanicus who had very small Legs had by the frequent use of this exercise brought his to be very big but he rid without Styrrups after meat the humors descending upon their pendulent instability But the Scythians by their continuall and immoderate use of Horsemanship became the most impotent and Eunuch-like men in the world as Hippocrates affirmeth of them For they being ill
of which kind there be many in those parts of Guiana but is supposed to proceed from some infirmity of body Among other wild men the Cinnaminians are to be admired for their prolix beards Aldrovandus and the hairinesse of their whole bodies the women also being all over hairy These Relations make me wonder at the opinion of Platerus Platerus in Deformatione observ lib. 3. who denies that there are any wild men to be found all over hairy except the tip of their nose their knees and the palmes of the hand and feet as they are usually painted and conceived of by the Vulgar which that it is false we may hence saith he collect that Cosmographers who have described the whole world make no where mention of them when yet notwithstanding they have not omitted the wildest people the Amazons Canibals and Americans and others which go naked The cause of pilosity and yet are not hairy and those haires that naturally breake forth they pluck forth and eradicate It is observable and makes to our purpose that savage men are more hairy than those that are civill degenerating by their Bruitish kind of life into the nature and resemblance of beasts who are more hairy than men Besides the generall examples of all barbarous Nations we have a particular demonstration of this Bruitish Metamorphosis in the transformation of Nebuchadnezzer Dan. 4. and more lately in the storie of Iohn of Leiden mentioned by Sir K. Digby in his Treatise of the soule The cause of the natural smoothness in men is not as my L. Bacon noteth any abundance of heat and moisture Lord Bacons nat hist cent 7. exp 680. though that indeed causeth pilosity but there is requisite to pilosity not so much heat and moisture as excrementitious heat moisture for whatsoever assimilateth goeth not into the haire and excrementitious moisture aboundeth most in Beasts and Men that are more savage The head indeed of man hath haire upon the first birth which no other part of the body hath The cause may be want of perspiration for much of the matter of haire in the other parts of the body goeth forth by insensible perspiration And besides the Skull being of a more solid substance nourisheth and assimilateth lesse and excerneth more and so likewise doth the Chin we see also that haire commeth not upon the Palmes of the Hands nor Soles of the Feet which are parts more perspirable And Children likewise are not hairy for that their skins are more perspirable Many have been born abounding with shagged haire almost like unto water-Spaniels Men borne with shagged haire like a water Spaniel we read first of Esau that he was the first of this Tribe Gen. cap. 27. Majolus in Colloquiis and Majolus recites a story that in the Town of Pisa named Petrosancta there was borne of a smooth woman a Virgin covered all over with long haire whose image Aldrovandus hath exhibited the cause of which effect Authors refer to the Picture of St Iohn Baptist painted after the usuall manner cloathed in Camels haire whose image hanging in her Chamber the mother had wishtly beheld All rugged with haire having pawes like a Beare was that Infant which was borne 1282. Lycosthenes of an illustrious Matron Martin the fourth being then Pope of Rome by whose command all the Pictures of Beares which were found in that Ladies house were blotted out and defaced a manifest argument of the received imagination of the Effigies of the Beares in Conception Peucerus Peucerus seemes to confirme this production by another such like case declaring that Anno 1549. he saw a Child covered over with a Beares skin Moreover Columbus confesseth Columbus that he saw a certaine Spaniard beset with long haires in all parts of his body except his hands and Face Julius Caesar Scaliger Scaliger remembers a certaine little Spaniard covered with white haires which he reports to have been brought out of India or to have been borne of Indian Parents in Spaine Also Henry the second Boscius King of France at Paris caused a young man who was no lesse hairy than a Dog to be instructed and bred up a Scholler And of late in the Pallace of the Duke of Parma there were hairy men kept Nations that wind their bones like Sinews who were brought from other parts to wit as I conceive Platerus in D format obser lib. 3. from France for Platerus who denieth that there beany hairy Nations yet alloweth that there are many of both Sexes more hairy than others confesseth that he saw at Brasil Anno 1583. being then to be transported into Italy the Children of this hairy man begotten of a smooth woman to wit a boy of nine yeares and a girle of seven yeares old who together with their mother had been sent into Flanders to the Duke of Parma Purch Pilgr 1. lib. 1. Jo. Bohem. de rit gent. lib. 3. Geor. Draud com in Solin Magin in Geog. Indiae orient Maffaeus hist ind lib. 1. In the Island of Iamuli the Inhabitants who exceed us foure Cubits in stature and the holes of whose eares are much wider than ours winde their bones this way and that way as they please like sinewes so do the Nairoes also Maginus and Maffaeus both say that after their seventh yeare they are prepared to an incredible agility and dexterity by often annointing their whole body with the oyle Sesamum whereby their nerves and bones are so suppled and relaxed that they can easily winde and turne their bodie and at pleasure bow it to what part they please afterwards they accustome themselves with all care and diligence in corporall exercises and learne nimbly to handle their Armes The Author of the descript of Nova Francia lib. 2. cap. 10. And the Author of the description of Nova Francia saies that these Nobles and Warriours of the Malabars the Nairoes to make themselves such they help Nature and their sinewes are stretched out even from seven yeares of Age which afterwards are anointed and 〈◊〉 â—â—th the oile of Sesamum which make◠〈…〉 well their bodies at will that they seeme to have no bones Art used to make maids fat Schenckius thinkes without doubt they have nervous bones Schenck obser de cap. 355. Yet they who should see our Funambuli and Tumblers who have been brought up from their youth to their feats of activity would think as much of them whom we have seen to twist and winde their bodies very strangely as if they had no bones The Mangones Hier. Merc. de decoratione 14. Galen Method cap. 16. that they might make their bodies more fat for sale were wont to whip their buttocks and loines with rods and so by degrees make them more fleshy which is noted by Galen as no contemptible stratagem to attract the nourishment to the outward parts And there be nations out of the Tropicks who by exercise and
Art come to such agility as the Nairo's have Turpis Romano Belgicus ore color But the Venetian Dames have the harder taske to please For all bodies may be made leane but it is impossible to fatten where a vehement heat or driness is by nature for one may easily substract from Nature but to adde to Nature is difficult when vertue doth not cooperate among the rest they who have great Livers are very difficultly improved with flesh All other Creatures if they have sufficient and proper food will grow fat and be franked whereas men although they have the best aliment exhibited to them will not in like manner be fat the chiefe cause whereof as to man is imputed to his temperament but there are three causes found which impedes the fatting of man Corpulency where in great esteeme The first is the great variety and dissimilitude of meat to which appertaines that many men observe not a certaine time of repast whence there ariseth unequall concoctions the other cause is immoderate venery or venerious cogitations but the third and chiefest cause is to be attributed to the sollicitous cares of his mind which dry his very bones The Gordians Bruson Facet Exempl l. 7. when they appoint one to be their Chiefe they chuse one of the most corpulent amongst them for corpulency with them contrary to the opinion of Epaminondas the Theban is held a corporall vertue whereas he could not endure a corpulent Souldier saying that three or foure shields would not suffice to cover his belly who had not a long time seene the witnesses of his own Virility The Goths would not elect any man to be their King except he were tall grosse and very corpulent On the contrary the Sarazens would have no King to command over them except he were little leane and low of stature Opinions although opposite yet well considered neither side may be void of reason The Author of the Treasury of Times vol. 1. lib. 3. cap. 17. Jo. Bohem. de morib gent. li. 3. Reasons pro and con you may find in the Treasury of Times which are too long here to insert The ancient Gaules through their assiduous labour and exercise were all leane and spare bodied and their bellies very little set out for they did so abhor a paunch that young men whose bellies exceeded the measure of their Girdles were publikely punished Marcus Aurelius was wont to say that hogs and horses fatnesse did well become them Monstrous fat men but that it was more commendable in men to be leane and slender for that your grosse men are commonly grosse witted besides they have a filthy wallowing gate they are unfit to fight either for themselves or their friends they are a kind of unweildy lump an unprofitable masse of flesh and bone being not able to use any manly exercise whereas we see it is quite otherwise in those that are leane and not laden with fat Among the Lacedemonians fat folkes were not only in disgrace but they did punish them by most severe Laws made against them For Lycurgus appointed a small Diet to the Lacedemonians on purpose that their bodies by that streight diet might grow up more in height for the vitall spirits not being occupied to concoct and digest much meat nor yet kept down nor spread abroad by the quantity or over-burden thereof do enlarge themselves into length and shoot up for their lightsomenesse and for this cause they thought the body did grow in height and length having nothing to let or hinder the rising of the same It seemeth saith Plutarch that the selfe same cause made them fairer also For Over fed bodies encounter Nature Plut. in the Life of Lycurgus the bodies that are leane and slender do better and more easily yield to Nature which bringeth a better proportion and a forme to every member and contrariwise it seemeth these grosse corpulent and over-fed bodies do encounter Nature and be not so nimble and pliant to her by reason of their heavy substance As we see it by experience the children which women bring before their time and be somewhat cast before they should have been borne be smaller and fairer also and more pure commonly than other that go their time because the matter whereof the body is formed being more supple and pliant is the easier weilded by Nature which giveth them their shape and forme the naturall cause of which effect he gives place to them dispute it who will without farther deciding the same And indeed as Levinus Lemnius observes it is confirmed by daily experience that children who do much Gormandize grow up lesse comely neither shoot up to a just and decent longitude for the Native heat is suffocated and over-whelmed with too much moisture that it cannot shape the body to a comely taleness of stature wheras they who are fed moderately and use a sparer diet feed only at certain set times become not very grosse neither increase in flesh or grow fat but their bones thereupon increase in length So we see young men children in long continued sicknesses to grow lean and slender yet their bodies to shoot out in length and to increase in stature which Lemnius should thinke happens by reason of drinesse for the bones since they are dry Men growing Giants by a disease they are nourished with an aliment familiar agreeable unto them seeing that in sick men the humours and aliment received through heat and the drinesse of the body become dry the bones are extended in length and by reason of the somewhat dry nourishment they gaine some advantage in stature especially when man is in such an age wherein his body as soft and ductile Potters clay may be formed and produced in length Remarkable examples of this truth are to be found for they have been seen whom a Quartan-Ague hath raised into a Giant-like bulk and stature Spigelius hath a story of one Anthony of Antwerp who lived in his time who being borne a little and weake Infant of a sudden through a disease became a great Giant Such with the Greeks are called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in whom there lies hid the Seminary of a disease which cals forth a prodigious augmentation with an untimely death Salamine the son of Euthemen in three yeares grew up to the height of three cubits as Pliny reports In like manner a son of Cornelius Tacitus the Noble Historian died young Every man hath a certaine and determinate time set to his growth wherein by degrees and tacite augmentations he attaineth either to a legitimate or Dwarfish stature and that power of encreasing whereby the body happens to be enlarged in longitude is seldome produced beyond the five and twentieth yeare but for the greatest part is terminated within one and twenty yeares but to grow fat and corpulent happens not to be done in certaine spaces of time but by reason of nutriment when it is plentifully taken in which may
this was a fashion of old ibid. The errours of Nurses in ordering Infants tending to this mischiefe 340 The commendation of those Nations who never lace themselves but affect a round and full wast 342 343 The art they use to this purpose 344 Where the Breasts are accounted shamefull parts 315 The reason in Nature why women should have a modest regard of their Breasts ibid Breech-Gallantry 409 VVHY Man naturally hath no taile ibid. Divers tailed Nations 410 411 412 Tailed Monsters 412 How a tale comes to be monstrously added to a humane offspring 413 Sodomiticall abusers of this part noted and condemned 413 414 415 Body NAtions that embroder their skins with Iron pens and seare race pinke cut and pounce their Bodies 455 457 458 469 466 Where they have skin prints and past Garments for their Bodies 456 Where they paint their Bodies red white black blew tawney and other colours in works such as they devise 457 458 459 460 461 462 463 464 465 469 Enquire about Negroes and how so great a part of man-kinde became blacke 466 467 468 469 Nations that affect the plumage of Birds and dresse their Bodies all over with their feathers 470 471 Hairy Nations 472 The cause of Pilosity 474 Men borne with shagged Haire like a water Spanell 475 Nations that winde their bones like sinews 476 Art used to make maids fat 477 Why all men cannot be franked or made fat 478 Corpulency where in great esteem 479 Monstrous fat men 480 481 Fat folkes where in disgrace 482 Overfed-bodies encounter Nature 483 Men growing Gyants by a disease 484 The cause of tall stature 485 Meanes to accelerate growth or stature 486 487 Fatnesse when it doth prejudice Nature 488 The naturall magnitude of the Body 489 A way to make men by Art 490 The opinion of learned men touching this Artifice 491 The Pygmies of Paracelsus 492 The Commensuration of Womans Body vindicated 493 The Historyes of Pigmies maintained 494 496 497 488 Nations of little men 495 Pigmies without all question 499 Dwarfes made by art 500 The reason of dwarfish stature 501 That the Divell may make Pigmies 502 503 Histories of Giants 503 504 She Gyants 505 The cause of small stature 506 The cause of tallnesse of stature Nations of Gyants 508 Men of very tall stature 509 Over-tallnesse of stature a deformitie 510 Whether Divels may have to doe That Divels may exercise venerious acts with women 514 That Divels cannot generate upon Women 515 The Originall of Gyants 515 The supposed Originall of Neroes 516 Why the Amazons did lame their Male Children 517 An Art pretending to new make a Man 518 That Nature sometimes workes wonders in this kinde ibid. 519 That Monsters may be made by the Art of naturall Magique 520 alias 516 Mans Metamorphosis 519 alias 521 Whether Men can be transform'd into Beasts 502 alias 522 Whether Witches have power to transubstantiate others 521 alias 523 That the soule of Man cannot informe a Beasts body 522 alias 524 Transubstantiation denied 523 alias 525 Mans transformation into an Asse questioned 524 alias 526 525 alias 527 The inpiety of transubstantiation 526 alias 528 527 alias 529. Changelings and the Legerdemane thereof 527 528 alias 529 530. In the Introduction THE unimitable curiosity and exact perfection of the structure of mans Body maintained against the errour of Epicurus That it doth appeare that the humane forme hath been altered â—â—aâ— waâ—â—s both by art and diurnall succession The audacious art of new moulding the body reprehended and the inconveniences thereof noted Midwives and Nurses by their unskilfulnesse or neglect the causers of the ill figure of the Body That every part of the new-born Infants Body is to be formed according to the most advantage of Nature That this is the end of Cosmeticall Physicke Mercurialis his complaint that this most noble art of Cosmetiques is growne out of use C Cheeke NAtions who bore holes in their Cheeks for a Gallantry 163 164 Where they make lines above their lips upon their Cheeks with certaine Iron Instruments 164 Cheek-markers condemned 165 Inscisions upon the Cheeke of old forbidden E Ears NAtions whose Eares doe reach the ground and who use their Eares for a couch to sleep on 141 142 143 Nations with Eares so large that they cover the rest of their Body with them ibid. An infant borne with such large and great Eares 143 Nations with their Eares hanging down to their shoulders and lower 144 145 146 By what art and industry they attaine unto so great Eares 145 146 147 Nations that bore pierce or slit the lappet of their Eares and load them with ponderous Jewels 145 146 147 148 149 Where the greatest Eares are esteemed the fairest and they accounted more honorable that have them 146 147 The deformity introduced by the artificiall great Eares 157 The use of the lobe or lower lappet of the Eare. 156 Where the wider the holes are the more noble they esteem themselves to be 146 The prodigious widenesse of their Eare-holes measured ibid. Nations with their Eares bored full of holes 149 Where long Eares are held such a note of Gallantry that they call them Apes that have not their Eares long 145 Where their Gallantry is to weare pegs of wood slender like knitting needles a finger long and make them looke like hedge-hoggs 149 Large Ear'd shee-Gallants 148 Prodigious kind of Earings and Pendants worne by most Nations 148 150 151 152 153 What beauty it was that Nature invented in the outward Ear. 155 Men with Asses Eares 159 Where People have the nether part of their Eares cut into a round circle hanging downe very low upon their Cheeks 151 152 Why man had lesse Eares assigned him then other Animals 157 The naturall proportion symetry and beauty of the Eare. ibid. and 155 The prodigious vanity of Earrings noted and exploded 154 155 The use of the outward Eare. 156 That this horrid affectation of great Eares in this pack of large Ear'd hell-hounds savours of more then the ordinary vanity incident to mankinde 157 Where they affect to have a small Eare standing close to their Head 158 What artifice and industry Nurses use to forme Infants Eares unto their minde ibid. The inconveniences of little Ears and the vanity of man in this supposed beauty and the dammage proceeds hence to the action of the Eare. 158 159 Monsters with very large double and round Eares 160 Nations the holes of whose Ears are much wider then ours ibid. Nations who have no Eares at all and yet heare most exactly ibid. Infants borne without Eares ibid. The sad condition of those who are deprived of the outward Eare. 160 161 Eyes NAtions with one Eye planted in their forehead 101 102 103 104 A Monocular childe born 104. Why man hath naturally two Eyes 101 Children borne without Eyes 104 Nations without Eyes ibid. 240 Men with foure Eyes 105 Men that have Eyes in their Shoulders ibid. 240 A man with two Eyes in the
Nations that have but one Hand 301 302 Monsters borne without Hands 302 303 The strange recompence such Monsters finde 303 Nations that want Hands 306 A strange story of one born with a stones in one Hand and one in the other L Leg. NAtions that have but one Leg. 422 Long-Legg'd Nations 423 433 Certaine People where the women affect to have their thighs hips and Legs very thick 425 What art they use to accommodate their fancies in this busines ib. The folly of this custome derided ibid. Other people where the men and women affect great Calves and full Legs 425 426 The absurd Cavill of Momus against the frame of the Leg of man exploded 426 427 A Calfe-swelling punishment inflicted upon some Nations 427 A Crane Legg'd man 428 Little Legs in women what signe 4â—7 Where the women are well proportioned in their Legs ibid. A way to bring Legs to a convenient magnitude 429 Low-pitch'd Calves where in request 430 What industry they use to have it so ibid. High pitcht Calfes where in request 429 430 What meanes they use to advance the Calfe ibid. The impertinency in tampering with Childrens weak Legs 431 432 Their opinion confuted by experience who thinke Children would have distorted Legs unlesse they were diligently involved and constringed in swaithbands 336 That this indiscreet swaithing of Children is many times a cause of the crookednesse of the Legs 334 The crookednesse of the Knee and Leg bones in the Rickets how sometimes occasioned 328 229 A Tailors and Bakers Legs how caused 432 Nations that make lists or markes on their Legs which are esteemed with them a great gallantry 433 Where the womens Legs are crooked ibid. Where the women almost all of them halt ibid. Short-legg'd Nations ibid. Centaures and Onocentaures 437 Men with the Legs of other animals 433 434 435 436 Monsters with the Head and privities of men but with the hand and feet of Apes 437 438 Their originall 437 Satyrs and their originall 439 Gynny Drils of what Tribe 440 Monsters with foure Legs 300 Which kinde of Ape is most like man 441 When Apes began to grow like men 443 Sea-men or men fishes 444 The opinion of the learned concerning semi-men and semi-Beasts 445 Lips VVHere they brand their Lips with red hot Irons especially their upper Lips so make streaks and lines in them 176 Nations that bore holes in their Lips to set precious stones rings and other things therein 176 177 178 179 180 181 The use of the Lips set out 181 182 What uses are hindered or frustrated to the prejudice of Nature by the boring and lading the Lips with Jewels and other things 182 Nations that seem not to understand the naturall uses of Lips 183 184 185 186 187 188 189 190 191 192 Nations that have flat mouths without lips 170 Nations that have copp'd fastigiated Lips ibid. Where there are men who have Lips of a monstrous bignesse 174 Imputed to a prevarication of art ibid. Where they love those that have thick lips ibid That great Lips redound to the prejudice of Nature in her operations 174 175 Where they have Lips propendent a cubit low which they nourish instead of a beard 171 172 That they are hereby dumb ibid. Nations that have their lips about their mouth so great that when they steep in the sun they cover all their faces with their Lips 173 Some that can bind their Heads with their Lips as well as women do with their haire ibid. Prodigiously prominent and thick lips ibid. 174 Nations that have concrete lips with a hole only in the middle 170 Haire-lips their cause and cure 175 M Mouth VVIde mouths where affected by women they being accounted most beautifull who have the widest mouths 167 168 A conjecture of their using Art to have them so ibid. The naturall proportion of the mouth 169 For women to affect the commendation of beauty in a wide mouth much derogates from the honesty of Nature and her ordinary justice 169 What they may probably suffer by a mouth so wide 170 A little Mouth most commendable in women 169 Why the mouth was given to man 168 Misplaced mouths 175 Men with monstrous mouths 170 Nations that have but one hole in their face ibid. Dwarfes that have no mouths ibid. N Nailes LOng Nailes where extreamely affected as a signe of idle Gentility 289 290 291 292 The hindrance that this affected fashion causeth to the operations of the tops of fingers 291 295 Where it is one of the points of bravery with the principall women to weare long nailes 293 This noted as a great Solicisme in Nature 298 Where to weare long nailes on the Thumbe is a prerogative royall 293 Where they never pare their Nailes 192 193 Long unpared nailes condemned as against the intention of Nature 296 The end of the growth of the nailes not to repaire their decay by wearing 298 Nailes never intended as weapons of offensive scratching in man or woman 298 299 That the care of conforming extravagant Nailes to the Law of Nature appertaines to reason and the practique intellect 264 295 296 297 Long Nailes thought by some to be a sin 297 The use of the Nailes 298 Where the women cut their nailes and jog them round 289 The dignity and majesty of Nature in the encrease of nailes defended 294 Where it is the fashion and beauty of the Country to make the nailes of their hands red yellow and party coloured and where they gild them 288 289 How they do it ibid. Their offence against Nature noted and the naturall beauty of the Naile vindicated 290 Necks MEn with Necks of a Cubit long 275 Nations with their Necks so long that they resemble the neck of a Crane ibid. 276 Long gangrell Necks inconvenient ibid. Philoxenes his wish for a long Neck exploded ibid. Nations that have no Neck 277 That it is not impossible for a man to live without a Neck 278 An Infant borne without a neck 277 Where men and women have gutturall bottles hanging down at their throat even to their navels 278 The cause of that swelling in their throats 279 Nose VVHere the women cut and pare their Noses between their Eyes that they may seeme more flat and saddle Nosed 112 This trespasse against beauty and the majesty of Nature exploded 113 What benefits and reall beauties these people deprive themselves of by this affected deformity 114 Where they use to cut off their Nostrils from their Noses 115 Nations that have no Nose nor nostrils 116 The ornament and naturall beauty of the Nose maintaâ—ned 116 117 The utility of the Nose and the beauty of office or officiall elegancy thereof declared 118 The reasons why the Nose was placed in the middle of the Face between the Eyes 114 Men whose Noses are flat like broken winded Horses 119 An Infant born with such Nostrils ibid. Where they are held for the finest women who have little Noses 120 What art they use to prohibit the