pitch of absurdity. It reached behind to the very top of the head, and the tenuity of the lawn or cambrick of which it was made was such, that Stowe prophecies, they would shortly "wear ruffes of a spider's web." In order to support so slender a fabrick, a great quantity of starch become necessary, the skilful use of which was introduced by a Mrs. Dingen Van Plesse in 1564, who taught her art for a premium of five guineas. Starching was subsequently improved by the introduction of various colours, one of which, the yellow die, being the invention of a Mrs. Turner, who was afterwards concerned in the murder of Sir Thomas Overbury, was dismissed with abhorrence from the fashionable world, in consequence of this abandoned woman being executed at Tyburn in a ruff of her favourite tint. The extreme indignation with which Stubbes speaks of the use of starch is highly amusing: "One arch or piller," says he, "wherewith the devil's kingdome of great ruffes is underpropped, is a certain kind of liquid matter which they call startch, wherein the devill hath learned them to wash and die their ruffes, which, being drie, will stand stiff and inflexible about their neckes. And this starch they make of divers substances-of all collours and hues, as white, redde, blewe, purple, and the like."

We are further informed by the same vehement satirist, that the ruff had the additional support of an underpropper called a suppertasse, and that its plaits were adjusted by poking-sticks made of iron, steel, or silver, that, when used, were heated in the fire, a custom against which he expresses his wrath by relating a most curious story of a gentlewoman of Antwerp who had her ruff poked by the devil on the 27th of May, 1582, " the sound whereof," says he, " is blowne through all the world, and is yet fresh in every mans memory." It appears that this unfortunate lady, being invited to a wedding, could not, although she employed two celebrated laundresses, get her ruff plaited according to her taste, upon which, proceeds Stubbes, "she fell to sweare and teare, to curse and ban, casting the ruffes under feete, and wishing that the devill might take her when shee did wear any neckerchers againe;" a wish which was speedily accomplished; for the devil,

assuming the form of a beautiful young man, made his appearance under the character of a suitor, and enquiring the cause of her agitation, "tooke in hande the setting of her ruffes, which he performed to her great contentation and liking; insomuch, as she, looking herselfe in a glasse (as the devill bad her) became greatly inamoured with him. This done, the young man kissed her, in the doing whereof, he writhed her neck in sunder, so she died miserably; her body being straight waies changed into blew and black colours, most ugglesome to beholde, and her face (which before was so amorous) became most deformed and fearfull to looke upon. This being knowne in the citie, great preparation was made for her buriall, and a rich coffin was provided, and her fearfull body was laide therein, and covered very sumptuously. Foure men immediately assayed to lift up the corpes, but could not move it; then sixe attempted the like, but could not once stirre it from the place where it stood. Whereat the standers-by marvelling, causing the coffin to be opened to see the cause thereof: where they found the body to be taken away, and a blacke catte, very leane and deformed, sitting in the coffin, setting of great ruffes, and frizling of haire, to the greate feare and woonder of all the beholders."*

The waist was beyond all proportion long, the bodice or stays terminating at the bottom in a point, and having in the fore part a pocket, for money, needle-work, and billets, a fashion to which Proteus alludes in the Two Gentlemen of Verona, when he tells Valentine

"Thy letters

shall be deliver'd

Even in the milk-white bosom of thy love." +

Gowns were made of the richest materials, with velvet capes embroidered with bugelles, and with the sleeves curiously cut; the

Anatomie of Abuses, 4to. p. 43.

+ Reed's Shakspeare, vol. iv. p. 248.

See Katharine's Gown, in Taming of the Shrew, Reed's Shakspeare, vol. ix. p. 157.

fashionable petticoat was the Scottish fardingale, made of cloth, taffety, satin, or silk, and of enormous bulk, so that when an Elizabethan lady was dressed in one of these, with the gown, as was usually the case, stuffed about the shoulders, and the ruffe in the first style of the day, her appearance was truly formidable. Over all was frequently thrown a kirtle, mantle, or surcoat, with or without a head, formed of silk or velvet, and richly bordered with lace.

Silk-stockings, which were first worn by the Queen in 1560, Mrs. Montagu, her silk-woman, having presented her with a pair of this material in that year, soon became almost universal among the ladies, and formed one of the most expensive articles of their dress.

Shoes with very high heels, in imitation of the Venetian chopine, a species of stilt sometimes better than a foot in height, was the prevalent mode, and carried, for the sake of increasing the stature, to a most ridiculous excess. It never reached, indeed, this enormous dimension in England, but seems, from a passage in Hamlet, to have been of such a definite size, as to admit of a reference to it as a mark of admeasurement, for the Prince remarks, "Your Ladyship is nearer to heaven, than when I saw you last, by the altitude of a chopine."

Fans, constructed of ostrich feathers, inserted into handles of gold, silver, or ivory, and wrought with great skill in various elegant forms, were so commonly worn that the author of "Quippes for upstart newfangled Gentlewemen," 1595, exclaims,

"Were fannes, and flappes of feathers, found

To flit away the flisking flies,

The wit of women we might praise,

But seeing they are still in hand,

In house, in field, in church, in street;

In summer, winter, water, land,

In colde, in heate, in drie, in weet;

I judge they are for wives such tooles

As bables are, in playes, for fooles." †

* Reed's Shakspeare, vol. xviii. p. 144.-Mr. Douce has given a plate of the chopine, in his second volume on Shakspeare, p. 234.

Restituta, vol. iii. p. 257.

Silver and ivory handles were usual among ladies of the middle class of society; but in the higher ranks they were frequently decorated with gems, and the Queen had several new-year's gifts of fans, the handles of which were studded with diamonds and other jewels. * Shakspeare has many allusions to fans of feathers; and even hints, in his Henry the Eighth, that the coxcombs of his day were not ashamed to adopt their use. ‡

Perfumed bracelets, necklaces, and gloves, were favourite articles. "Gloves as sweet as damask roses," form part of the stock of Autolycus, and Mopsa tells the clown, that he promised her “a pair of sweet gloves." § The Queen in this, as in most other luxuries of dress, set the fashion; for Howes informs us, that in the fifteenth year of her reign, Edward Vere, Earl of Oxford, presented her with a pair of perfumed gloves trimmed with four tufts of rose-coloured silk, in which she took such pleasure that she was always painted with those gloves on her hands, and that their scent was so exquisite that it was ever after called the Earl of Oxford's perfume. ||

To these notices it may be added, that a small looking-glass pendent from the girdle ¶, a pocket-handkerchief richly wrought with gold and silver, and a love-lock hanging wantonly over the shoulder, were customarily exhibited by the fashionable female.

Burton, writing at the close of the Shakspearean era, has given us a brief but exact enumeration of the feminine allurements of his day; a passage which, whilst it adds a few new particulars, will

*«In a list of jewels given to the Queen at New-years tide, 1589, is A fanne of fethers, white and redd, the handle of golde, inamaled with a halfe moone of mother of perles, within that a halfe moone garnished with sparks of dyamonds, and a few seede perles on the one side, having her Majestie's picture within it; and on the back-side a device with a crowe over it. Geven by Sir Frauncis Drake.'"-Nichols's Progresses, vol. ii. p. 54. note.

+ Reed's Shakspeare, vol. v. p. 80.; vol. xi. p. 261. &c. &c.

furnish an excellent recapitulation of what has been already advanced.

66

Why," exclaims he, "do they decorate themselves with artificial flowers, the various colours of herbs, needle works of exquisite skill, quaint devices, and perfume their persons, wear inestimable riches in precious stones, crown themselves with gold and silver, use coronets and tires of several fashions; deck themselves with pendants, bracelets, ear-rings, chains, girdles, rings, pins, spangles, embroideries, shadows, rebatoes, versicoler ribands? Why do they make such glorious shews with their scarfs, feathers, fans, masks, furs, laces, tiffanies, ruffs, falls, calls, cuffs, damasks, velvets, tinsels, cloth of gold, silver tissue? Such setting up with corks, straitening with whale bones; why, it is but as a day-net catcheth larks, to make young ones stoop unto them. And when they are disappointed, they dissolve into tears, which they wipe away like sweat: weep with one eye, laugh with the other; or as children, weep and cry they can both together: and as much pity is to be taken of a woman weeping as of a goose going barefoot.” *

We have seen in the extract from Harrison, at the commencement of this chapter, that a great portion of it is employed in satirising the extravagance and folly of the male-dress of his times, and the adduction of further particulars will serve but to strengthen the propriety of his invective, and to prove, what will scarcely be credited, that, in the absurdity and frivolity of personal ornament, the men far surpassed the other sex.

Though there is reason to conclude that this taste for expensive and frivolous declaration, was originally derived from the reign of

Anatomy of Melancholy, folio, 8th edit. p. 293, 294. 307.-In Vaughan's "Golden Grove," also, the first edition of which appeared in 1600, may be found some curious notices on "superfluitie of apparell" with regard to both sexes; he tells us that the women in the early ages of the world "imitated not hermaphrodites, in wearing of men's doublets. They wore no chaines of gold, &c.—they went not clothed in velvet gownes, nor in chamlet peticotes. They smelt not unto pomander, civet, muske, and such lyke trumperies."