WHEN BATHS WERE AN EVENT
Quben: Elizabeth's custom of bathing njay have been the subject of admiring comment,'but to "some of her contemporaries baths smacked of heretical opinion, says the "Manchester Guardian." In FoxVs."Book of Martyrs" George. Wishart's habit of taking cold baths is; mentioned as a peculiar novel^ ■ Foxe says the Scottish reformer "had coimnohly by his bedside a tub of water in Which; his pebple being in bed, the candle put out, and all quiet, he used to bathe himself." Wishart was, apparently afraid of being misunderstood, and misunderstood he was by one-commentator who regarded clean martyrs'with suspicion. Father Parson/? noted agaihst this passage: "If you weigh the sariie well, you will think that he was as fit for madness as martyrdom, and all his continual having a tub of water by him may smell of some,.Jewish or, Moorish superstition." ;in 'the eighteenth century, even among the .aristocracy, taking a bath Was! an event, and, moreover, it called for & hecomihg modesty. Mrs. Montagu, "the Queen bf the Blue-stockings," complained when visiting the Duchess oi pbrtferid that she had the greatest
difficulty in procuring a bath-tub "capable of holding water." After much trouble she was able to announce triumphantly, "My bathing-tub is ready for me, so tomorrow I shall go in." Alas! there was still one difficulty to overcome. "Pray look for my bathingdress," she begged. "Till then I must go in chemise and jupon."
Her friend, Miss Dorothea Gregory, also found it embarrassing to come in a too immodestly close contact with water. From Edinburgh she wrote: "I find there is a cold bath in the house. Miss Gordon thinks I shall do well to make use of it; but as I was not aware of such a thing being in the house I did not bring my bathing-dress with me."
The university authorities of Bangor by insisting that in future all licensed students' lodgings should contain a bathroom show a better pedagogic attitude towards baths than was common in Victorian times. As late as 1886 an archdeacon, giving, evidence before a Royal Commission on residential training colleges for teachers, complained that an inspector had "ordered complete sets of baths for all the students. Now, these girls will never see a bath when they leave their training college in their future life. It is accustoming them to luxuries and creating a taste which they will not be ablto gratify afterwards."
WHEN BATHS WERE AN EVENT
Evening Post, Volume CXXVI, Issue 44, 20 August 1938, Page 27
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