The "mirror" to which Wordsworth refers was the Claude mirror, an optical device used by many artists and devotees of the picturesque during the Romantic period, which includes the decade of the Regency.

Wordsworth did not approve of the use of either the Claude mirror or the Claude glass, both of which rendered views of the natural world in a manner he considered unnatural. But both of these devices had been popular in the later part of the eighteenth century and continued to be so in the first decades of the nineteenth century.

So just what are Claude glasses and mirrors?

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As with many other curious things which have been chronicled here, the decade of the Regency saw the last lingering use of the Long S, at least in print. Most people continued to use it in those documents which they wrote by hand, regardless of its demise on the printed page.

The Long S, what it was, its origins, its rules of usage and how it passed into history ... almost.

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Perhaps abandoned is a more appropriate description of the fate of this live-saving practice by the medical community in the early years of the Regency.

Surely I must be mistaken, as mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, that which the English call mouth-to-mouth ventilation, was not known until the mid-twentieth century? Sadly, there is no mistake. How this happened ...

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This is rather off topic, in terms of the Regency, but not if you love books, as I do. I spend a lot of time with books, and have found a whole zoo of animals which makes working with books more convenient, as well as charmingly whimsical.

If you are a book lover, or know one for whom you are seeking a special gift, then perhaps one of these bookish little critters might be just the thing.

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