wanton ladies
'One of my longings is to have a couple of lusty able bodied
men to take me up, one before and another behind, as the new
fashion is, and carry mee in a Man-litter into the great bed at Ware'.
Richard Brome, The Sparagus Garden (1635), II.ii.39-41
Prudish ones be aware: this quote reads like a 17th-century woman's threesome fantasy. Actually she is hoping to sit in a newfangled sedan chair, where the chair bearers each carry the poles at front and back. Because of its secrecy and comfort, the mode of transport is a favourite with delicate female travellers. It came to be associated with their illicit sexual behaviour, for a lady who isn't at her proper place at home is bound to be up to some dirty business. I was also looking at a broadside ballad, 'News from Hyde Park', which dates from 1670. This time the speaker is a north-country gallant who happily journeyed to Hyde Park, London to marvel at the beautiful spring flowers and fashionable city ladies. The gallant's wooing antics must have worked, for he managed to ride off with one of them in the coach, heading straight to the hot babe's chamber. He waits in her bed as she prepares to undress; the action is about to begin! Out of curiosity, the poor chap peeped through the key hole and discovered that:
'She took off her head-tire, and show'd her bald pate... Her bald-pate did look like an Estritche's egg'.
'She put up her finger, and out dropt her eye'.
'She fetcht a yawn, and out fell her teeth'.
'She washt all the paint from her visage, and then / She look'd just (if you will believe me) / Like a Lancashire Witch of four-score and ten'.
Hehehe, quite weird.