Now a few lines to paper I will put, Of mens Beards strange and variable cut: In which there's some doe take as vaine a Pride, As almost in all other things beside. Some are reap'd most substantiall, like a brush, Which makes a Nat'rall wit knowne by the bush: (And in my time of some men I have heard, Whose wisedome have bin onely wealth and beard) Many of these the proverbe well doth fit, Which sayes Bush naturall, More haire then wit. Some seeme as they were starched stiffe and fine, Like to the bristles of some angry swine: And some (to set their Loves desire on edge) Are cut and prun'de like to a quickset hedge. Some like a spade, some like a forke, some square, Some round, some mow'd like stubble, some starke bare, Some sharpe Steletto fashion, dagger like, That may with whispering a mans eyes out pike: Some with the hammer cut, or Romane T,[163] Their beards extravagant reform'd must be, Some with the quadrate, some triangle fashion, Some circular, some ovall in translation, Some perpendicular in longitude, Some like a thicket for their crassitude, That heights, depths, bredths, triforme, square, ovall, round, And rules Ge'metricall in beards are found. Besides the upper lip's strange variation, Corrected from mutation to mutation; As 'twere from tithing unto tithing sent, Pride gives to Pride continuall punishment. Some (spite their teeth) like thatch'd eves downeward grows, And some growes upwards in despite their nose. Some their mustatioes of such length doe keepe, That very well they may a maunger sweepe: Which in Beere, Ale, or Wine, they drinking plunge, And sucke the liquor up, as 'twere a Spunge; But 'tis a Slovens beastly Pride, I thinke, To wash his beard where other men must drinke. And some (because they will not rob the cup), Their upper chaps like pot hookes are turn'd up; The Barbers thus (like Taylers) still must be, Acquainted with each cuts variety-- Yet though with beards thus merrily I play, 'Tis onely against Pride which I inveigh: For let them weare their haire or their attire, According as their states or mindes desire, So as no puff'd up Pride their hearts possesse, And they use Gods good gifts with thankfulnesse.[164] [163] Formed by the moustache and a chin-tuft, as worn by Louis Napoleon and his imperialist supporters. [164] _Works of John Taylor, the Water Poet, comprised in the Folio edition of 1630_. Printed for the Spenser Society, 1869. "_Superbiae Flagellum_, or the Whip of Pride," p. 34. The staunch Puritan Phillip Stubbes, in the second part of his _Anatomie of Abuses_ (1583), thus rails at the beards and the barbers of his day: