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sorte) would think them to have golden heades; and some weare lettice caps, with three hornes-three corners, I should say-like the forked cappes of priests, with their perriwinkles, chitterlings, and the like."

In Ellis's "Letters," we read, among some items relating to the wardrobe of Queen Elizabeth, under the head Attier, the following:

“Item. One cawle of hair set with pearles in number xliij. "Item. One do. set with pearle of sundry sort and bigness, with seed pearle between them chevron wise cxcj.

"Item. A cawle with nine trueloves of pearle, and seven buttons of gold, in each button a rubie."

From this extract we are led to suppose that the false hair was called the CAUL, but on other occasions it is certainly intended to describe a head dress: thus an old poem says:—

"These glittering coules of golden plate,
Wherewith their heads were richly dect,
Makes them to seem an Angel mate
The judgment of the simple sect."

And another author exclaims :

"Silk gownes and velvet shalt thou have,
With hoods and caules fit for thy heade,
Of goldsmiths' work a border brave,
A chain of gold ten double spread."

French hoods were now the mode, and continued fashionable till the reign of Charles the First. "Then on toppes of their stately turrets (I mean heades)," says the indefatigable Stubbs, "(wherein is more vanitie than true philosophie now and then) stand their

capitall ornaments, as French hood, hatte, cappe,

kercher, and such like;

whereof some be of velvet, some of taffatie, some (but few) of wooll; some of this fashion, some of that, some of this colour, some of that, according to the variable phantasies of their serpentine minds. And to such excess is it growne, as every artificer's wife (almost) will not sticke to goe in her hatte of

velvet every day; every merchant's wife and meane gentlewoman in her French hood-and every poore cottager's wife in her taffatie hatte, or else of wool at least."

Frontlets were now worn very broad, and frequently highly ornamented; they fell over the face, and served to protect the skin from the sun. Bonnets, too, began to be la grande mode; they were first brought from Italy. Hall mentions "millen bonnets of damaske gold, with lose gold, that did haug downe their backes," and "millen bonnets of crymson satten, drawn through with cloth of gold."

Elizabeth is represented in one of her portraits with a head-dress, ornamented with jewels, very nearly resembling a cushion; a richly-laced ruff, laid in close plaits, stands out on each side of her face for a considerable way, and rests upon her bosom. From the back of her gown two wings, probably of fine lawn, edged with a border of jewels, and stiffened with wire, rise in semicircular sweeps as high as the

[graphic]

top of the head-dress, and turning down to the ears,

form the general shape

of a heart, with the face, encircled with the ruff, set in the midst. A short, clumsy cloak, covered with jewels and embroidery, covers the body of the gown, but allows the small cuffs of the sleeves, the full ruffles, and an ornament above the former, to be seen. The strait and formal stomacher gives her majesty an immensely long waist. It is covered with jewels

[graphic]

and embossed gold, and her lower garment, or petticoat, is of rich velvet.

In another portrait the hair is also turned over a cushion, but without any ornament. Instead of the immense ruff and wings mentioned above, a sort of fan, of clear muslin, edged with rich lace, stands up behind the neck. What this curious fabric is called, or why worn, Fashion alone can tell; but it is fre quently seen in the pictures of the time of Queen Elizabeth. The robe is made very tight, quite plain, long-waisted, and has tight sleeves, but the farthingale which puffs it out over the hips gives it a very ridiculous appearance.

In general, the size of the ruffs was enormous, probably to keep the farthingales in countenance.

As

her gracious majesty is represented in almost all her portraits with the hair dressed as we have described, we may suppose that it was her favourite coiffure, and if so, it was, undoubtedly, the fashionable head-dress of her time. Sometimes she is seen with a small cap, ornamented with frills, placed on the back of her head.

It is perhaps strange that Elizabeth, hating, as she certainly did, every thing Spanish, should have adopted two of their modes, and continued partial to them for so many years.

Among the various head-dresses of this reign, we find one called the ship tire; which Warburton tells us "was an open coiffure, that left the neck and shoulders exposed." Another, denominated the tire valiant, was, on the contrary, so closed up with kerchiefs, of various kinds, that nothing could be seen above the eyes or below the chin.

The lower class of females generally wore caps. "The men and women, also," says Malone, “had what were then called thrum'd hats,' they were made of a coarse kind of woollen cloth." Shakspeare mentions them and another part of female attire, when he makes Mrs. Page exclaim, “ And there's her thrum'd hat, and her muffler too." The latter was, probably, a very ancient addition to dress, which concealed the lower part of the face, and not the coverings for the hands, mentioned under the same name in the early reigns of our kings.

Masks and vizors of velvet, with glasses for the eyes, were now worn; they were kept on the face by a bead attached to the inner part, and held in the mouth of the wearer.

The gentlemen at this period banished the full pourpoint, and, delighting in extremes, replaced it by a tight vest, resembling a waistcoat. They also now wore more moderate-sized ruffs.

Stubbs devotes a whole chapter to the hats of this period. "Sometimes," he says, "they use them sharpe on the crowne, peaking up like the speare or shaft of a steeple, standing a quarter of yard above the crowne of the head. Some others are flatte and broade on the crowne like the battlements of a house. Another sort have round crownes, sometimes with one kind of band, sometimes with another

now black, now white: now russet, now red: now green, now yellow now this, now that; never content with one colour or fashion two days to an end. And thus they spend the Lord's treasure, consuming their golden years and silver days in wickedness and sin." Again we read: "And as the fashions be rare and strange, so is the stuffs whereof their hats be made divers also; for some are of silk, some of velvet, some of taffety, some of sarcenet, some of wool, and, which is more curious, some of a certain kind of fine hair; these they call Bever hats, of 20, 30, or 40 shillings price, fetched from beyond the seas, from whence a great sort of other vanities come besides."

In Holinshed's "Chronicle" we find the following remarks upon the dress of this time. "Nothing," says he, "is more constant in England than inconstancy of attire. Oh, how much cost is bestowed now-a-days upon our bodies, and how little upon our souls! How How many suits of apparel hath the one, and how little furniture hath the other! How long a time

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