Part 17

On November 2 Pepys buys a vest like the King's.

On November 22 the King of France, Louis XIV., who had declared war against England earlier in the year, says that he will dress all his footmen in vests like the King of England. However, fashion is beyond the power of royal command, and the world soon followed in the matter of the Persian coat and vest, even to the present day.

Next year, 1667, Pepys notes that Lady Newcastle, in her velvet cap and her hair about her ears, is the talk of the town. She wears a number of black patches because of the pimples about her mouth, she is naked-necked (no great peculiarity), and she wears a _just au corps_, which is a close body-coat.

Pepys notices the shepherd at Epsom with his wool-knit stockings of two colours, mixed. He wears a new camlett cloak. The shoe-strings have given place to buckles, and children wear long coats.

In 1668 his wife wears a flower tabby suit ('everybody in love with it'). He is forced to lend the Duke of York his cloak because it rains. His barber agrees to keep his periwig in order for L1 a year. He buys a black bombazin suit.

In 1669 his wife wears the new French gown called a sac; he pays 55s. for his new belt. His wife still wears her old flower tabby gown. So ends the dress note in the Diary.

JAMES THE SECOND

Reigned four years: 1685-1689.

Born 1633. Married, 1661, Anne Hyde; 1673, Mary of Modena.

THE MEN AND WOMEN

In such a short space of time as this reign occupies it is not possible to show any great difference in the character of the dress, but there is a tendency, shown over the country at large, to discard the earlier beribboned fashions, and to take more seriously to the long coat and waistcoat. There is a tendency, even, to become more buttoned up--to present what I can only call a frock-coat figure. The coat became closer to the body, and was braided across the front in many rows, the ends fringed out and held by buttons. The waistcoat, with the pockets an arm's length down, was cut the same length as the coat. Breeches were more frequently cut tighter, and were buttoned up the side of the leg. The cuffs of the sleeves were wide, and were turned back well over the wrist.

Of course the change was gradual, and more men wore the transitional coat than the tight one. By the coat in its changing stages I mean such a coat as this: the short coat of the early Charles II. period made long, and, following the old lines of cut, correspondingly loose. The sleeves remained much the same, well over the elbow, showing the white shirt full and tied with ribbons. The shoe-strings had nearly died out, giving place to a buckle placed on a strap well over the instep.

There is a hint of growth in the periwig, and of fewer feathers round the brim of the hat; indeed, little low hats with broad brims, merely ornamented with a bunch or so of ribbons, began to become fashionable.

Swords were carried in broad baldricks richly ornamented.

The waistclothes of Mr. Pepys would, by now, have grown into broad sashes, with heavily fringed ends, and would be worn round the outside coat; for riding, this appears to have been the fashion, together with small peaked caps, like jockey caps, and high boots.

The ladies of this reign simplified the dress into a gown more tight to the bust, the sleeves more like the men's, the skirt still very full, but not quite so long in the train.

Black hoods with or without capes were worn, and wide collars coming over the shoulders again came into fashion. The pinner, noticed by Pepys, was often worn.

But the most noticeable change occurs in the dress of countryfolk and ordinary citizens. The men began to drop all forms of doublet, and take to the long coat, a suit of black grogram below the knees, a sash, and a walking-stick; for the cold, a short black cloak. In the country the change would be very noticeable. The country town, the countryside, was, until a few years back, distinctly Puritanical in garb; there were Elizabethan doublets on old men, and wide Cromwellian breeches, patched doubtless, walked the market-place. Hair was worn short. Now the russet brown clothes take a decided character in the direction of the Persian coat and knickerbockers closed at the knee. The good-wife of the farmer knots a loose cloth over her head, and pops a broad-brimmed man's hat over it. She has the sleeves of her dress made with turned-back cuffs, like her husband's, ties her shoes with strings, laces her dress in front, so as to show a bright-coloured under-bodice, and, as like as not, wears a green pinner (an apron with bib, which was pinned on to the dress), and altogether brings herself up to date.

One might see the farmer's wife riding to market with her eggs in a basket covered with a corner of her red cloak, and many a red cloak would she meet on the way to clep with on the times and the fashions. The green apron was a mark of a Quaker in America, and the Society of Friends was not by any means sad in colour until late in their history.

Most notable was the neckcloth in this unhappy reign, which went by the name of Judge Jeffreys' hempen cravat.

WILLIAM AND MARY

Reigned thirteen years: 1689-1702.

The King born in 1650; the Queen born in 1662; married in 1677.

THE MEN

First and foremost, the wig. Periwig, peruke, campaign wig with pole-locks or dildos, all the rage, all the thought of the first gentlemen. Their heads loaded with curl upon curl, long ringlets hanging over their shoulders and down their backs, some brown, some covered with meal until their coats looked like millers' coats; scented hair, almost hiding the loose-tied cravat, 'most agreeably discoloured with snuff from top to bottom.'

My fine gentleman walking the street with the square-cut coat open to show a fine waistcoat, his stick hanging by a ribbon on to his wrist and rattling on the pavement as it dragged along, his hat carefully perched on his wig, the crown made wide and high to hold the two wings of curls, which formed a negligent central parting. His pockets, low down in his coat, show a lace kerchief half dropping from one of them. One hand is in a small muff, the other holds a fine silver-gilt box filled with Vigo snuff. He wears high-heeled shoes, red heeled, perhaps, and the tongue of his shoe sticks up well above the instep. Probably he is on his way to the theatre, where he will comb his periwig in public, and puff away the clouds of powder that come from it. The fair lady in a side box, who hides her face behind a mask, is delighted if Sir Beau will bow to her.

We are now among most precise people. One must walk here with just such an air of artificiality as will account one a fellow of high tone. The more enormous is our wig, the more frequently we take a pinch of Violet Strasburg or Best Brazil, Orangery, Bergamotte, or Jassamena, the more shall we be followed by persons anxious to learn the fashion. We may even draw a little silver bowl from our pocket, place it on a seat by us, and, in meditative mood, spit therein.

We have gone completely into skirted coats and big flapped waistcoats; we have adopted the big cuff buttoned back; we have given up altogether the wide knee-breeches, and wear only breeches not tight to the leg, but just full enough for comfort.

The hats have altered considerably now; they are cocked up at all angles, turned off the forehead, turned up one side, turned up all round; some are fringed with gold or silver lace, others are crowned with feathers.

We hear of such a number of claret-coloured suits that we must imagine that colour to be all the rage, and, in contrast to other times not long gone by, we must stiffen ourselves in buckram-lined skirts.

These powdered Absaloms could change themselves into very fine fighting creatures, and look twice as sober again when occasion demanded. They rode about the country in periwigs, certainly, but not quite so bushy and curled; many of them took to the travelling or campaign wig with the dildos or pole-locks. These wigs were full over the ears and at the sides of the forehead, but they were low in the crown, and the two front ends were twisted into single pipes of hair; or the pipes of hair at the side were entirely removed, and one single pipe hung down the back. The custom of thus twisting the hair at the back, and there holding it with a ribbon, gave rise to the later pigtail. The periwigs so altered were known as short bobs, the bob being the fullness of the hair by the cheeks of the wig.

The cuffs of the coat-sleeve varied to the idea and taste of the owner of the coat; sometimes the sleeve was widened at the elbow to 18 inches, and the cuffs, turned back to meet the sleeves, were wider still. Two, three, or even more buttons held the cuff back.

The pockets on the coats were cut vertically and horizontally, and these also might be buttoned up. Often the coat was held by only two centre buttons, and the waistcoat flaps were not buttoned at all. The men's and women's muffs were small, and often tied and slung with ribbons.

Plain round riding-coats were worn, fastened by a clasp or a couple of large buttons.

The habit of tying the neckcloth in a bow with full hanging ends was dying out, and a more loosely tied cravat was being worn; this was finished with fine lace ends, and was frequently worn quite long.

Stockings were pulled over the knee, and were gartered below and rolled above it.

The ordinary citizen wore a modified edition of these clothes--plain in cut, full, without half the number of buttons, and without the tremendous periwig, wearing merely his own hair long.

For convenience in riding, the skirts of the coats were slit up the back to the waist; this slit could be buttoned up if need be.

Now, let us give the dandy of this time his pipe, and let him go in peace. Let us watch him stroll down the street, planting his high heels carefully, to join two companions outside the tobacco shop. Here, by the great carved wood figure of a smoking Indian with his kilt of tobacco leaves, he meets his fellows. From the hoop hung by the door one chooses a pipe, another asks for a quid to chew and a spittoon, the third calls for a paper of snuff newly rasped. Then they pull aside the curtains and go into the room behind the shop, where, seated at a table made of planks upon barrels, they will discuss the merits of smoking, chewing, and snuffing.

'We three are engaged in one cause, I snuffs, I smokes, and I chaws.'

THE WOMEN

Let me picture for you a lady of this time in the language of those learned in dress, and you will see how much it may benefit.

'We see her coming afar off; against the yew hedge her weeds shine for a moment. We see her figuretto gown well looped and puffed with the monte-la-haut. Her echelle is beautiful, and her pinner exquisitely worked. We can see her commode, her top-not, and her fontage, for she wears no rayonne. A silver pin holds her meurtriers, and the fashion suits better than did the creve-coeurs. One hand holds her Saxon green muffetee, under one arm is her chapeau-bras. She is beautiful, she needs no plumpers, and she regards us kindly with her watchet eyes.'

A lady of this date would read this and enjoy it, just as a lady of to-day would understand modern dress language, which is equally peculiar to the mere man. For example, this one of the Queen of Spain's hats from her trousseau (curiously enough a trousseau is a little bundle):

'The hat is a paille d'Italie trimmed with a profusion of pink roses, accompanied by a pink chiffon ruffle fashioned into masses bouillonnee arranged at intervals and circled with wreaths of shaded roses.'

The modern terms so vaguely used are shocking, and the descriptive names given to colours by dress-artists are horrible beyond belief--such as Watteau pink and elephant grey, not to speak of Sevres-blue cherries.

However, the female mind delights in such jargon and hotch-potch.

Let me be kind enough to translate our William and Mary fashion language. 'Weeds' is a term still in use in 'widow's weeds,' meaning the entire dress appearance of a woman. A 'figuretto gown looped and puffed with the monte-la-haut' is a gown of figured material gathered into loops over the petticoat and stiffened out with wires 'monte-la-haut.' The 'echelle' is a stomacher laced with ribbons in rungs like a ladder. Her 'pinner' is her apron. The 'commode' is the wire frame over which the curls are arranged, piled up in high masses over the forehead. The 'top-not' is a large bow worn at the top of the commode; and the 'fontage' or 'tower' is a French arrangement of alternate layers of lace and ribbon raised one above another about half a yard high. It was invented in the time of Louis XIV., about 1680, by Mademoiselle Fontage. The 'rayonne' is a cloth hood pinned in a circle. The 'meurtriers,' or murderers, are those twists in the hair which tie or unloose the arrangements of curls; and the 'creve-coeurs' are the row of little forehead curls of the previous reign. A 'muffetee' is a little muff, and a 'chapeau-bras' is a hat never worn, but made to be carried under the arm by men or women; for the men hated to disarrange their wigs.

'Plumpers' were artificial arrangements for filling out the cheeks, and 'watchet' eyes are blue eyes.

The ladies have changed a good deal by the middle of this reign: they have looped up the gown till it makes side-panniers and a bag-like droop at the back; the under-gown has a long train, and the bodice is long-waisted. The front of the bodice is laced open, and shows either an arrangement of ribbon and lace or a piece of the material of the under-gown.

Black pinners in silk with a deep frill are worn as well as the white lace and linen ones.

The ladies wear short black capes of this stuff with a deep frill.

Sometimes, instead of the fontage, a lady wears a lace shawl over her head and shoulders, or a sort of lace cap bedizened with coloured ribbons.

Her sleeves are like a man's, except that they come to the elbow only, showing a white under-sleeve of lace gathered into a deep frill of lace just below the elbow.

She is very stiff and tight-laced, and very long in the waist; and at the waist where the gown opens and at the loopings of it the richer wear jewelled brooches.

Later in the reign there began a fashion for copying men's clothes, and ladies wore wide skirted coats with deep-flapped pockets, the sleeves of the coats down below the elbow and with deep-turned overcuffs. They wore, like the men, very much puffed and ruffled linen and lace at the wrists. Also they wore men's waistcoat fashions, carried sticks and little arm-hats--chapeau-bras. To complete the dress the hair was done in a bob-wig style, and the cravat was tied round their necks and pinned. For the winter one of those loose Dutch jackets lined and edged with fur, having wide sleeves.

The general tendency was to look Dutch, stiff, prim, but very prosperous; even the country maid in her best is close upon the heel of fashion with her laced bodice, sleeves with cuffs, apron, and high-heeled shoes.

QUEEN ANNE

Reigned twelve years: 1702-1714.

Born 1665. Married, 1683, Prince George of Denmark.

THE MEN AND WOMEN

When I turn to the opening of the eighteenth century, and leave Dutch William and his Hollands and his pipe and his bulb-gardens behind, it seems to me that there is a great noise, a tumultuous chattering. We seem to burst upon a date of talkers, of coffee-houses, of snuff and scandal. All this was going on before, I say to myself--people were wearing powdered wigs, and were taking snuff, and were talking scandal, but it did not appeal so forcibly.

We arrive at Sedan-chairs and hoops too big for them; we arrive at red-heeled shoes. Though both chairs and red heels belong to the previous reign, still, we arrive at them now--they are very much in the picture. We seem to see a profusion, a confused mass of bobbins and bone lace, mourning hatbands, silk garters, amber canes correctly conducted, country men in red coats, coxcombs, brass and looking-glass snuff-boxes.

Gentlemen walk past our mental vision with seals curiously fancied and exquisitely well cut. Ladies are sighing at the toss of a wig or the tap on a snuff-box, falling sick for a pair of striped garters or a pair of fringed gloves. Gentlemen are sitting baldheaded in elegant dressing-gowns, while their wigs are being taken out of roulettes. The peruquier removes the neat, warm clay tube, gives a last pat to the fine pipes of the hair, and then gently places the wig on the waiting gentlemen. If you can look through the walls of London houses you will next see regiments of gentlemen, their faces pressed into glass cones, while the peruquier tosses powder over their newly-put-on periwigs. The bow at the end of the long pigtail on the Ramillies wig is tied--that is over.

Running footmen, looking rather like Indians from the outsides of tobacco shops, speed past. They are dressed in close tunics with a fringed edge, which flicks them just above the knee. Their legs are tied up in leather guards, their feet are strongly shod, their wigs are in small bobs. On their heads are little round caps, with a feather stuck in them. In one hand they carry a long stick about 5 feet high, in the top knob of which they carry some food or a message. A message to whom?

The running footman knocks on a certain door, and delivers to the pretty maid a note for her ladyship from a handsome, well-shaped youth who frequents the coffee-houses about Charing Cross. There is no answer to the note: her ladyship is too disturbed with household affairs. Her Welsh maid has left her under suspicious circumstances, and has carried off some articles. The lady is even now writing to Mr. Bickerstaff of the _Tatler_ to implore his aid.

This is the list of the things she has missed--at least, as much of the list as my mind remembers as it travels back over the years:

A thick wadded Calico Wrapper.

A Musk-coloured Velvet Mantle lined with Squirrels' Skins.

Eight night shifts, four pairs of stockings curiously darned.

Six pairs of laced Shoes, new and old, with the heels of half 2 inches higher than their fellows.

A quilted Petticoat of the largest size, and one of Canvas, with whalebone hoops.

Three pairs of Stays boulstered below the left shoulder. Two pairs of Hips of the newest fashion.

Six Roundabout Aprons, with Pockets, and four strip'd Muslin night rails very little frayed.

A silver Cheese toaster with three tongues.

A silver Posnet to butter eggs.

A Bible bound in Shagreen, with guilt Leaves and Clasps, never opened but once.

Two Leather Forehead Cloathes, three pair of oiled Dogskin Gloves.

Two brand new Plumpers, three pair of fashionable Eyebrows.

Adam and Eve in Bugle work, without Fig-leaves, upon Canvas, curiously wrought with her Ladyship's own hand.

Bracelets of braided Hair, Pomander, and Seed Pearl.

A large old Purple Velvet Purse, embroidered, and shutting with a spring, containing two Pictures in Miniature, the Features visible.

A Silver gilt box for Cashu and Carraway Comfits to be taken at long sermons.

A new Gold Repeating Watch made by a Frenchman.

Together with a Collection of Receipts to make Pastes for the Hands, Pomatums, Lip Salves, White Pots, and Water of Talk.

Of these things one strikes the eye most curiously--the canvas petticoat with whalebone hoops. It dates the last, making me know that the good woman lost her things in or about the year 1710. We are just at the beginning of the era of the tremendous hoop skirt.

This gentleman from the country will tell me all about it. I stop him and remark his clothes; by them I guess he has ridden from the country. He is wearing a wide-skirted coat of red with deep flap pockets; his coat has buttons from neck to hem, but only two or three--at the waist--are buttoned. One hand, with the deep cuff pushed back from the wrist to show his neat frilled shirt, is thrust into his unbuttoned breeches pocket, the two pockets being across the top of his breeches. Round his neck is a black Steenkirk cravat (a black silk tie knotted and twisted or allowed to hang over loose). His hat is of black, and the wide brim is turned back from his forehead. His wig is a short black periwig in bobs--that is, it is gathered into bunches just on the shoulders, and is twisted in a little bob at the back of the neck. I have forgotten whether he wore red or blue stockings rolled above the knee, but either is likely. His shoes are strong, high-heeled, and have a big tongue showing above the buckle.