Various - The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. Volume 20, No. 565, September 8, 1832

PERSIAN BATH

The luxurious indulgence of baths in the East is generally known to the reader of travels, so as to render acceptable the following details. They are extracted from Mr. Buckingham's Travels, 1 1 Travels in Assyria, Media, and Persia. H. Colburn, 4to., 1829. and bear all the graphic minuteness of his entertaining pen.

The Bath is one of the principal ones of Kermanshah, an important frontier town of Persia. "It was entered by a porch, extremely clean, and neatly ornamented by painting and other devices on its ceiling and walls. This remarkable contrast to the low, dark, and foul passages which generally lead to Turkish baths, was a presage, upon the very threshold, of greater comfort and accommodation within.

"When we reached the undressing-room, this prepossession was still further strengthened. Here we found a square hall, well lighted from above, having on three of its sides elevated recesses for the visiters, and on the fourth, the passage from the outer porch to the hall, and from this to the inner bath. At the angles of these raised recesses, and dividing their lower roof, which they supported, from the higher one of the central square, were, four good marble pillars, with spirally fluted shafts, and moulded capitals, perfectly uniform in size and design, and producing the best effect. In the centre of the square space, which these marked out, and on a lower floor, was a large marble cistern of cold water; and at each end of this, on wooden stands, like those used in our arbours and breakfast rooms, were arranged coloured glass jars, with flowers of various kinds in them, well watered and perfectly fresh.

"The walls of this outer hall were ornamented all around by designs of trees, birds, and beasts, in fanciful forms, executed in white upon a blue ground. We undressed here, and were led from hence into the inner bath, where all was still free from everything offensive, either to the sight or smell. This inner room was originally an oblong space of about fifty feet by twenty-five, but had been since made into two square divisions. The first, or outer one, was a plain paved hall, exactly like the undressing-room, except that it had no side recesses, but its floor was level, close to the walls. There were here also four pillars; and in the square space which they enclosed in the centre of the room, was a cistern of water as in the outer one. It was on the floor of this that the visiters lay, to be washed by the attendants; for there were no raised seats for this purpose as in Turkish baths, and the great octagonal one, with its cold fountain, the sides and tops of which are ornamented with mosaic work of marble in Turkey, was here replaced by the cistern described.

"The second division to which this room led, consisted of three parts; the central one was a large and deep bath, filled with warm water, its bottom being level with the lower floor of the building, and the ascent to it being by three or four steep steps.

"As few pleasures are entirely perfect, so here, with all its general apparent superiority to the baths of Turkey, this was inferior to them in the most essential points. The attendants seemed quite ignorant of the art of twisting the limbs, moulding the muscles, cracking the joints, opening the chest, and all that delicious train of operations in which the Turks are so skilful. The visitors were merely well though roughly scrubbed, and their impurities then rinsed off in the large cistern above, from which there was neither a running stream to carry off the foul water, nor cocks of hot and cold to renew and temper it at pleasure, as in Turkey.

"In place of the luxurious moulding of the muscles, the use of the hair-bag, or glove, for removing the dirt, and the profusion of perfumed soap, with which the Turks end a course of treatment full of delight, the Persians are occupied in staining the beard and hair black, the nails of the toes and fingers of a deep red, and the whole of the feet and hands of a yellow colour, by different preparations of henna. This operation is the most unpleasant that can be imagined. The Persians do not shave the whole of the head, as is usual with most of the Turks and Arabs, but, taking of all the hair from the forehead, over the crown, and down the neck, for about a hand's breadth, they leave on each side two large bushy masses depending over their shoulders. This, then, with a very long and full beard, in which all the people here take pride, is plastered with a thick paste, of the consistence of hog's lard, and not less than two pounds weight of which is sometimes used on one person. It possesses a strongly astringent and penetrating quality, and requires great skill in the use of it, to avoid doing considerable mischief. As the eye-brows are plastered with it, as well as the rest of the hair, and as it softens by the heat of the room and of the body, it frequently steals into the eyes, and produces great pain.

"When all is finished, and the visiter leaves the inner bath, he is furnished with two cloths only, one for the waist, and the other to throw loosely over the head and shoulders: he then goes into the outer room into a colder air, thus thinly clad, and without slippers or pattens; no bed is prepared for him, nor is he again attended to by any one, unless he demands a nargeel to smoke; but, most generally, he dresses himself in haste, and departs."

In D'Israeli's Curiosities of Literature , there is an amusing and instructive account of the Origin of Psalm-Singing . It appears that Psalms in verse were first written by that elegant French poet, Clement Marot, the favoured court bard of Francis I., who was termed by his un-envious brother poets, "the poet of princes." They were published at Paris, and the volume contained fifty Psalms, written in various measures, and, which, from the beauty of their composition, (some specimens of which we have seen,) appear to be worthy of the muse of Marot. This "Holy Song Book," as he entitled it, was "humbly dedicated to the powerful King of France," and being considered by the volatile French people as an amusing novelty, it sold faster than any book of that period. In fact, the printers could not supply impressions fast enough for the demand; and, as the Psalms were considered in the light of ballads, they were set by the people to popular tunes, and were commonly sung as ballads.

This good reception of Marot's Psalms induced the celebrated Theodore Beza to continue the collection; and another volume was printed, of which 20,000 were immediately sold: this was a considerable circulation, when we consider the few readers that then existed, in comparison with the number of readers in the present age. These had the advantage over Marot's of being set to tunes of greater spirit. Beza, in his preface, says, that "these Psalms are admirably suited for the violin and other musical instruments;" and our readers will learn, not without surprise, that through the instrumentality of the gloomy Calvin, these compositions were set to most beautiful and simple airs. He wisely took advantage of popular feeling to spread his religious opinions, through the means of melody, and, in furtherance of this plan, he engaged the most celebrated composers of his time to furnish tunes to these Psalms. At first, the scheme was not discovered: for Catholics sang the Psalms as well as Hugonots; but, when Calvin appointed these Psalms, with their music, to be sung at his meetings, there was an end to the solace of the dreary hours of the poor Catholics. Marot himself was compelled to quit Geneva; Psalm-singing became an open declaration of Lutheranism; and "woe to the poor wight" who was caught in the diabolical act of singing these "pernicious Psalms."