Snails Instead of Match.com? Husband Hunting in the 18t c. by Diane Scott Lewis

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In these modern times with the internet (and women freely allowed to enter bars) females have choices in their search for a mate. But in eighteenth century England, my era of research, girls were superstitious, and quite limited, especially in the small country villages.

An English lass's search for a husband was vitally important. In bygone periods marriage was what most young women had to look forward to, or they’d be ridiculed and regulated to spinsters, farmed out as governesses, or forced to live on the charity of their already poor families.

To this end, many relied on ancient customs and folklore. Most of these search-for-true-love customs revolved around the seasons.

Cerne Abbas

At the ruined Abbey of Cerne Abbas in Dorsetshire, girls flocked around the wishing-well in all seasons. To obtain their heart’s desire, they’d pluck a leaf from a nearby laurel bush, make a cup of it, dip this in the well, then turn and face the church. The girl would then "wish" for presumably a man she already has in mind, but must keep this wish a secret or it wouldn’t come true.

Other customs included, in Somersetshire on May Day Eve or St. John’s Eve, a lass putting a snail on a pewter plate. As the snail slithered across the plate it would mark out the future husband’s initials.

On another ritual to this end, writer Daniel Defoe remarked by saying: "I hope that the next twenty-ninth of June, which is St. John the Baptist’s Day, I shall not see the pastures adjacent to the metropolis thronged as they were the last year with well-dressed young ladies crawling up and down upon their knees as if they were a parcel of weeders,

Defoe

when all the business is to hunt superstitiously after a coal under the root of a plantain to put under their heads that night that they may dream who should be their husbands."

Throwing an apple peel over the left shoulder was also employed in the hopes the paring would fall into the shape of the future husband’s initials. When done on St. Simon and St. Jude’s Day, the girls would recite the following rhyme as they tossed the peel: St. Simon and St. Jude, on you I intrude, By this paring I hold to discover, without any delay please tell me this day, the first letter of him, my true lover.

On St. John’s Eve, his flower, the St. John’s Wort, would be hung over doors and windows to keep off evil spirits, and the girls who weren’t off searching for coal or snails in the pastures, would be preparing the dumb cake. Two girls made the cake, two baked it, and two broke it. A third person would put the cake pieces under the pillows of the other six. This entire ritual must be performed in dead silence-or it would fail. The girls would then go to bed to dream of their future husbands.

On the eve of St. Mary Magdalene’s Day, a spring of rosemary would be dipped into a mixture of wine, rum, gin, vinegar, and water. The girls, who must be under twenty-one, fastened the sprigs to their gowns, drink three sips of the concoction, then would go to sleep in silence and dream of future husbands.

On Halloween, a girl going out alone might meet her true lover. One tale has it that a young servant-maid who went out for this purpose encountered her master coming home from market instead of a single boy. She ran home to tell her mistress, who was already ill. The mistress implored the maid to be kind to her children, then this wife died. Later on, the master did marry his serving-maid.

Myths and customs were long a part of village life when it came to match-making. Now they sound much more fun than the click of a mouse on a computer. But then as now, you never know what you'll end up with.

In my novel, Ring of Stone,which takes place in eighteenth-century Cornwall, my heroine Rose will experience magic on All Hallows Eve and glimpse her future husband over her sHoulder.  Click the cover at the top of this Blog to buy a copy of Ring of Stone. Thanks for reading my blog post, and I hope you will purchase and enjoy my novel(s) as well.

For more on Diane Scott Lewis’s novels, visit her website: http://www.dianescottlewis.org

Source: English Country Life in the Eighteenth Century, by Rosamond Bayne-Powell, 1935.

"Doctor, I'm Sick," or Medical Practice in Eighteenth Century America By Shirley Martin

 

     Believe me, you wouldn't want to be sick in eighteenth century America.

    In my time travel romance, "Dream Weaver," the hero--Christian--is a doctor in 1762. In preparation for writing this romance, I read as much as possible about medicine in the eighteenth century.

    Let's start with a few basics. The average life span was thirty-five years, the death rate appalling. Very few people lived to the advanced age where cancer or heart disease manifested themselves. Only a very high birth rate allowed America to grow. The average married woman had seven children.

    Infection was the most common cause of death. Most doctors at this time recognized the value of cleanliness. Although those little, squiggly "animals" under a microscope were fascinating to watch, no one connected the bacteria with infection. The germ theory lay far in the future.

    In the eighteenth century, a pregnant woman was considered sick and indisposed for nine months. She was to avoid dancing and exercise, not to mention sex, for the duration.(One wonders how often this last proscription was observed.) Post childbirth infection was a feared complication of giving birth. Here again, cleanliness, or lack of it,was an important factor. Very few people in rural areas could afford doctors' fees, and someone other than a doctor performed delivery, often not bothering to wash their hands first.

    Since so many people couldn't afford doctors' fees, quacks abounded "like the locusts of Egypt." In colonial America, anyone who wanted to practice medicine could do so. Most doctors were trained as apprentices. However, American medical students considered the medical school in Edinburgh, Scotland, to be the premier source of a medical education. The courses there included anatomy, surgery, chemistry, pharmacy, and theory. American students in Edinburgh were conscientious scholars and spent long hours every day in the study and discussion of medicine. In 1765, the College of Philadelphia became the first medical school in America. Students had to give their thesis for a medical degree in Latin. Thereafter, America required a more stringent background for the practice of medicine.

    Amputations had a high mortality rate, and fractures of the vertebrae were considered fatal. We've all heard the term "bite the bullet."  It means to endure what you have to endure. More crudely, it means put up and shut up. If you've ever visited a historical fort and seen the bullets with the teeth marks, you might be able to imagine the agony of a patient having his leg sawed off without benefit of an anesthetic.

    Apothecaries in Europe and America sought Indian herbal medicine for many diseases. Sassafras tea was prescribed for infection and rheumatism, besides moths and bedbugs.

    Back then, many people who lived near poorly-drained areas suffered from the ague, what we now know as malaria. They believed that a miasma from the swamps caused this disease. It would be a long time before people realized that mosquitoes caused this malady. Yet strangely, the remedy then is the same as what is used today--Peruvian bark, today's source of quinine.

    Warfare has always advanced surgery. Gunpowder forever changed the strategy and tactics of warfare and also the problem of wound treatment. With gunpowder, casualties greatly increased. Most likely, because of the high casualty rate, doctors were forced to ignore advice on cleanliness. Sickness, not battlefield wounds, caused over 90% of the deaths in America during the Revolution. The conditions in the medical hospitals and field hospitals were appalling--dirty straw to lie on, lice, filth, wounds left untended for days. No wonder so many men died.

    The one great contribution of eighteenth century medicine was the development and practice of smallpox inoculation. In the early stages of this practice, many doctors and clergymen strongly opposed this practice, considering it against the will of God. Over time, the practice became accepted, and by the end of the Revolution, the entire American army had been inoculated. Thanks must go to George Washington for this for he recognized the value of smallpox inoculation.

    Inoculation was the first step in a process that virtually eliminated smallpox worldwide. Later, Edward Jenner developed smallpox vaccine, using the crusts from cowpox to prevent smallpox.

    In the latter part of the eighteenth century, a Virginia gentleman spent hours riding over his plantation, inspecting his property, marking trees and making notes. It was a cold, rainy and blustery December day. Later, he ate his evening meal without changing out of his wet clothes. Within a day, he developed a fever and a sore throat. A firm believer in bloodletting (a common remedy at the time), he asked his overseer to draw some blood. His condition worsened, and eventually three doctors attended him. They drew even more blood, until half of his blood was drawn. Besides that, the doctors purged him and gave him an emetic to induce vomiting. Finally, he asked them to just leave him alone. And shortly after, George Washington died quietly and at peace. 

 

Find Shirley Martin here: 

http://shirleymartinauthor.com/

http://bookswelove.net/authors/shirley-martin/

and find Dream Weaver at Amazon, B&N, and most ebook and print retailers

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B006HA3APY/

The Often Futile Efforts to Tame the Unmannerly Poor, by Diane Scott Lewis

In my research for my 18th century novels, I often find interesting, and downright bizarre historical details.

The Society for the Reformation of Manners was founded in 1691 in London. While concerned with brothels and prostitution, it also insisted that the poor (because the rich would never behave in such a way) needed instruction to tame their lewd and blasphemous behaviors.

In league with the Society for the Promotion of Christian Knowledge, the organization concerned itself with the morals and manners of those creatures who were less fortunate, and therefore, easily led astray.
Since the Revolution of 1688, England believed she had a special connection with divine providence, and must live up to that standard. Reformer Josiah Woodward opined that: “National sins deserve national judgments.”

In Bristol, England, a local “manners” society started prosecuting people for swearing and other indecent behavior.

People were beaten and put in pillories for these infractions. A woman was arrested for “Disorderly Walking.”

In 1704, Bristol’s poor were referred to as “lousing like swarms of locusts in every corner of the streets.” The indigent were morally contaminating the urban environment by their very appearance.

Workhouses and infirmaries were tasked with taming the poor. In one workhouse, groups of pauper girls were stripped, washed and given decent clothes, because outward changes led to inner ones. Appearance, behavior, and moral worth were all the same. They were then sent to hard labor. The girls’ emotions and personal feelings were never a consideration.
If the poor became ill, they couldn’t enter the infirmary unless they had clean clothes, because only respectable paupers should be healed. Charities were relied upon to provide these items. Inside the infirmary, no smoking, dice or cards was allowed as the people should be removed from corrupt influences. Patients were exposed to daily prayers, and some establishments had Biblical texts painted on the walls. Every ward had Bibles or prayer books, ignoring the fact that the majority of the poor couldn’t read.


St. Peter's Hospital (formally the Bristol Mint)

Hospitals and infirmaries were expected to cure the underprivileged of extravagance, cursing, and contempt of authority. Unfortunately, there was no mention of the cure of bodily ills.
Charity schools taught religion and compliance, but little about how to improve your lot in life.

The indulgent upper classes believed that everyone should know and remain in their proper place. The poor would stay poor, but should work hard and behave themselves. If work was difficult to find, and people starved, they should never swear about it and still attend church every Sunday, or they’d end up in gaol. 

The reason the lower orders were so ill-behaved was attributed to England’s liberal freedoms.
The Bristol society of manners eventually withered away when no one bothered to attend meetings anymore.

Clergyman Josiah Tucker called the poor brutal, insolent, debauched, and idle in their religion. He claimed that England was so careful of personal freedoms that “our People are drunk with the cup of Liberty.” His sermons became so damning, that he was followed in the streets by pauper boys who hurled insults at him. The refining of the poor obviously wasn’t working.

 
Resource: Patients, Power, and the Poor in Eighteenth-Century Bristol, by Mary E. Fissell, 1991

For more on the turbulent eighteenth century, check out my novels:
http://www.dianescottlewis.org

The Hazards of Dental Hygiene—and tooth extraction, Eighteenth-Century Style, by Diane Scott Lewis

It’s almost Turkey Day! Fun with family, (or arguments) and all that food...stuck in your teeth. In England, where they didn’t celebrate Thanksgiving, they still needed to clean up those pearly whites, and the eighteenth century had a unique manner of dental hygiene.

Up through the seventeenth century, dental care was erratic. Tooth extraction was usually performed by barber-surgeons and had a horrific and painful connotation. That pain and irregularity continued into the eighteenth century.

Teeth were hammered loose and jerked out sideways. Sometimes the patient was laid out on the floor with his head between the surgeon’s knees for the extraction of rotten teeth.

To advertise their services as “tooth-pullers,” these barber-surgeons hung rows of rotten teeth outside their shops. That must have been gruesome.

Thankfully the dental field did evolve in this century. Frenchman Pierre Fauchard (1678 –1761) is considered the father of modern dentistry. A highly skilled surgeon, he made remarkable improvements in dental instruments, often adapting tools from watch makers, jewelers and even barbers. He introduced dental fillings as treatment for dental cavities. He insisted that sugar derivate acids like tartaric acid were responsible for dental decay—a man ahead of his time.

In Britain “Operators for the teeth” developed into “dentists.” Samuel Darkin, who practiced in Whitechapel in the 1760’s, advertised himself as “Surgeon-dentist to his Majesty; Families attended by the year.” Several women combined dentistry with other skills, such as the enterprising Madame Silvie who made and fitted artificial teeth. “Those who don’t chuse to make their grievances known by asking for the Artificial Teeth-maker may ask for the Gold Snuff-box and Tweezer-case Maker.”

British surgeon John Hunter penned two important books in this time period, Natural History of Human Teeth (1771 ) and Practical Treatise on the Diseases of the Teeth (1778). In 1763 he entered into a period of collaboration with the London-based dentist James Spence. Hunter theorized the possibility of tooth transplants from one person to another.

The fear of tooth-pulling remained widespread (and without modern pain-killers it was understandable). After her niece’s excruciating experience, Jane Austen declared she would not let Mr. Spence “look at my teeth for a shilling a tooth and double it!”

Basic dental hygiene was little more than a toothpick and wiping down your gums with a cloth. Women suffered tooth loss worse than men due to vitamin loss during pregnancy. The poor also struggled with dental care.

Horse hair toothbrush

They were more concerned with buying food for their family than paying for tooth powders and the newly invented mass-produced toothbrush.

But dental procedures and care gained respect in the later eighteenth century. To avoid the pain of tooth extraction, or the expense of dentures, the art of teeth cleaning advanced.

England’s William Addis (a rag trader) is believed to have invented the first mass-produced toothbrush in 1780. In 1770, jailed for causing a riot, he found the prison method to clean teeth—rubbing a rag with soot and salt over your teeth—ineffective.  From one of his meals, he saved a small animal bone, drilled it with holes, and obtained bristles from a guard. He tied the bristles into tufts in the holes and sealed them with glue.

After his release, he started a business that would manufacture his toothbrushes, and he became very rich.
With the desire for better hygiene came the marketing of Toothpaste and powders. These were hyped as not only keeping teeth clean but in a time of rampant Pyorrhoea and scurvy, useful for fastening in those pesky loose teeth. Toothpowder came in a ceramic pot and was available either as a powder or paste. The ingredients could include crushed bones, oyster shells and pumice. The rich applied it with brushes and the poor with their fingers. 

 

A 1780 receipt for tooth powder:

1 1/2 oz. dragons blood  (not easy to find I imagine)
1 1/2 oz. cinnamon; and 1 oz. burnt alum.
Beat the above ingredients together and use every second day.

Horace Walpole put his faith in alum. He’d occasionally dissolve a lump in his mouth to keep his teeth strong. It must have tasted terrible.

Fauchard recommended using your own urine to clean your teeth—something that was always handy. Another method was bashing the end of a wooden skewer, to render it brush-like: “You must clean your teeth with this brush alone...once a fortnight, not oftener, dip your skewer brush into a few grains of gunpowder...”

Not surprisingly, most of these concoctions and methods did more harm than good by destroying tooth enamel.

Lord Chesterfield warned against the use of these sticks or any hard surface, as they “destroy the varnish of the teeth.” Smart man.

Delicate gold-handled toothbrushes, sometimes with replaceable heads, were included in the cases of toilet instruments for the rich. Toothpicks made of quills were the eighteenth-century dental floss and were kept in pretty jeweled boxes.

Toothpick box

Sounds more for show than practical use.

Fortunately for us, the knowledge and advantage of dental hygiene improved greatly in the years to come.

Sources: Dr. Johnson’s London by Liza Picard, and Wikipedia.

My eighteenth-century characters, strong-willed women, had healthy teeth: check out my website to visit the wilds of Cornwall:

http://www.dianescottlewis.org
http://bookswelove.net/lewis.php

Diane Scott Lewis - Crazy Superstitions on Bodily Health

In researching my eighteenth-century novel, Ring of Stone-I delved into this research for a character, a young physician-I came across many interesting beliefs on how to cure sickness.

Before modern medicine lay people and some physicians held the belief that transferring the ailment to another object could cure you of disease. Since antiquity, and well into the eighteenth century, people believed that men reflected aspects of the natural world. It was a dominant strategy that explained the mysteries beyond the ken of the science of the day.

A man in late seventeenth century Somerset claimed that his brother was cured of a rupture by being passed through a slit cut in a young ash tree, three times on three Monday mornings before dawn. When the tree was later cut down, his brother grew ill again.

To cure jaundice, you took the patient’s urine, mix it with ashes and make three equal balls. Put these before a fire, and when they dried out, the disease leaves and he’s cured.

In Devon, to cure the quartan ague, you baked the patient’s urine into a cake, then fed the cake to a dog, who would take on the disease.

Even Richard Wiseman—a Barber Surgeon—who wrote Chirurgicall Treatises during the time of Charles II, believed to remove warts you rub them with a slice of beef, then bury the beef.

Color as well played a part in how health was viewed. "Yellow" remedies were used to cure jaundice: saffron, celandine with yellow flowers, turmeric, and lemon rind. John Wesley, who wrote Primitive Physick, in the mid-eighteenth century, suggested that sufferers of this illness wear celandine leaves under their feet.

Health was also governed by astrological explanations. Manuals intended for physicians and apothecaries included this "otherwordly" advice. Nicholas Culpeper detailed which herbs were presided over by which planets in his famous health text, Culpeper’s Complete Herbal. For example, if a headache was caused by the actions of Venus, then fleabane (an herb of Mars) would cure the malady.

However, the Vox Stellarum, the most popular almanac in the eighteenth century, took a more moderate view: "Men may be inclin’d but not compell’d to do good or evil by the influence of the stars." Yet this same almanac, in 1740, listed which diseases were prevalent in certain months—a vestigial form of astrological medicine.

Thank goodness more enlightened physicians, such as brothers William (a leading anatomist and renown obstetrician) and John Hunter (one of the most distinguished scientists and surgeons of his day) in the eighteenth century, came along to bring medical thinking into the modern world.

William Hunter

Though superstition among the lay people remained.

Information taken from, Patients, Power, and the Poor in Eighteenth Century Bristol, by Mary E. Fissell, 1991.

For more on myths and superstition, check out my novel Ring of Stone, where the myths of a stone ring in remote Cornwall may save a life while destroying another.

Here's the beautiful cover by Michelle.

　
To learn more about my novels: http://www.dianescottlewis.org


　

　
　

Diane Scott Lewis - The Tribulations of Publication in the Eighteenth Century-or "Nothing much has changed"

Firstly, the Georgian author would struggle to find a publisher. Aspiring authors sought these prestigious men—for you’d be hard-pressed to find a lowly woman with their feeble brains in this profession—at the many booksellers’ shops that huddled in the shadow of St. Paul’s Cathedral in London. They would cart their precious manuscript to the Chapter Coffee House in Paternoster Row, where several stationers, booksellers and printers conducted their business.

If you lived in the provinces, too far from London, you had to use the postal service. The author would choose a bookseller, often after local advice, whose imprint he’d seen in newspaper advertisements or on a book’s title page. 

In 1759, Laurence Sterne, an obscure cleric in York, sent his unsolicited manuscript of Tristram Shandy to Robert Dodsley on the recommendation of John Hinxman, a York bookseller.

Sterne’s accompanying letter assured the publisher that his book had both literary and commercial value. Dodsley wasn’t impressed. He refused to pay the £50 Sterne requested for the copyright. The novel was rejected by a few publishers, but eventually achieved critical acclaim.

Whether the author approached a bookseller or used the post, his reception was usually chilly.

The arrogance if the bookseller was a common grievance among novelists, as depicted in Thomas Rowlandson’s drawing of 1780-84.

Though booksellers like Edmund Curll abused their position and their writers, many in this profession were honest and prudent men. They bore the burden of publication and profit and were inundated with manuscripts, most of which had no commercial merit. The sheer volume of submissions made it hard for them to discriminate. Most stayed with established figures rather than risk their money on an unknown author.

The hapless writer often resorted to appealing to the publisher’s personal interests, such as politics, religion, children’s literature or poetry. The astute author needed to research whom he’d submit to.

From the booksellers’ perspective, the letters Robert Dodsley received over thirty years showed authors as exacting and demanding in their requests, extolling their works as the perfect creations whose publication was eagerly awaited by the entire world, and they would "allow them to pass through his firm."

Aware of the fragile ego and financial status of writers, a few booksellers formed literary circles where authors could slake their thirst with food, alcohol and conversation. Brothers Charles and Edward Dilly, who published Boswell’s Life of Johnson, were famous for their literary dinners.

When an author approached a bookseller, he could also verify the merit of his work if he found a famous author who would publicly endorse it.

Dodsley

Dodsley’s literary career was promoted by Daniel Defoe. Despite bickering and competition, brother writers stood together to brace one another up in this risky endeavor.

Literary patronage—via a rich gentleman or the Court—was another way for an author to find publication, though this was fading by this century. Still, some thought of patronage as prostitution. Poet Charles Churchill proclaimed: "Gentlemen kept a bard, just as they keep a whore."

Subscription was another way to secure publication: collect pre-payments for a book not yet published. Dr. Johnson organized many subscriptions for unknown writers that he admired. He wasn’t always successful.

Constant rejection drove several authors to self-publish their works, which mirrors the Indie authors we have today. The uncertain road to publication over two hundred years ago seems much the same as the present.

Information garnered from: The Pleasures of the Imagination, English Culture in the Eighteenth Century, by John Brewer, 1997.

To see my extensive research into the eighteenth century, read my historical adventure set in England during the French Revolution: Betrayed Countess, available from Amazon.

http://www.amazon.com/Betrayed-Countess-Historical-Romance-ebook/dp/B00AS4CET8/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1357304063&sr=1-1&keywords=diane+scott+lewis


Visit my website for more info on my historical novels.

http://www.dianescottlewis.org