English Tattooing Fad

Tattooing as a fashionable fad has not reached New York as yet, but if reports are to be believed, says an exchange, it is still prevalent at the world’s metropolis. An eminent London physician, a specialist in skin diseases, is quoted as authority for the statement that the practice is much less general than has been supposed, yet he says that a number of peculiar and some very distressing cases have recently come under his notice. He adds: “As to whether such things can be effectually removed, I will only say here that much, of course, depends upon the extent and depth of the marks, but nearly all processes of removal leave a mark more or less unsightly. As to the utter folly in most cases of having these marks made, I can bear full witness. Only this summer I was consulted by the parents of a young lady who had been foolish enough years ago to have the name of a lover marked upon her arm. This fancy had wholly passed on and a new and brilliant matrimonial chance with a man she really loved had presented itself, but she dare not tell him of this marking, for he had never even heard of the other love, and was of a jealous disposition, and the young lady could not wear evening dress without a bandage around her arm. This is one of the common cases, and it seems trifling, but the bearer of the mark suffered great mental anguish and was made absolutely ill by it. But I can assure you that the disruption of a really happy marriage between two persons known to every one in society whose separation was a puzzle at the time to a wide circle, was brought about by a wretched and simple tattoo mark, for I was consulted by the lady, who was in an agony of misery. The two have never been reunited, I am sorry to say. Many of the persons who have consulted me have been men who have, as the expression goes, risen in life, and who have seemed to regard the marks upon their arms and hands as outward symbols of their former calling of mere laborers, but in certain of these cases the marks have been of a somewhat coarse significance. If I tried to recollect all the cases brought before me I could tell you some queer ones but I may mention one well-known peer–he got the title unexpectedly–who has the lobes of both ears tattooed.”