Chapter VI: Part 6

He had, in common with the marvellous characters of that Springtime of History, the quick intelligence and all the personal charm that the age brought forth in abundance. In his reign the accumulated mass of brain all over the world budded and flowered; the time gave to us a succession of the most remarkable people in any historical period, and it is one of the triumphs of false reasoning to prove this, in England, to have been the result of the separation from the Catholic Church. For centuries the Church had organized and prepared the ground in which this tree of the world's knowledge was planted, had pruned, cut back, nursed the tree, until gradually it flowered, its branches spread over Christian Europe, and when the flowering branch hanging over England gave forth its first-fruits, those men who ate of the fruit and benefited by the shade were the first to quarrel with the gardeners.

In these days there lived and died Botticelli, Leonardo da Vinci, Raphael, Duerer, Erasmus, Holbein, Copernicus, Luther, Rabelais, and Michael Angelo, to mention a few men of every shade of thought, and in this goodly time came Henry to the English throne, to leave, at his death, instead of the firm progress of order instituted by his father, a bankrupt country with an enormously rich Government.

You may see for the later pictures of his reign a great bloated mass of corpulence, with running ulcers on his legs and the blood of wives and people on his hands, striding in his well-known attitude over the festering slums his rule had produced in London. Harry, _Grace a Dieu_!

The mental picture from our--costume--point of view is widely different from that of the last reign. No longer do we see hoods and cowls, brown, gray, white, and black in the streets, no longer the throngs of fine craftsmen, of church-carvers, gilders, embroiderers, candle-makers, illuminators, missal-makers; all these served but to swell the ranks of the unemployed, and caused a new problem to England, never since solved, of the skilled poor out of work. The hospitals were closed--that should bring a picture to your eyes--where the streets had been thronged with the doctors of the poor and of the rich in their habits, no monks or lay brothers were to be seen. The sick, the blind, the insane had no home but the overhung back alleys where the foulest diseases might accumulate and hot-beds of vice spring up, while in the main streets Harry Tudor was carried to his bear-baiting, a quivering mass of jewels shaking on his corrupt body, on his thumb that wonderful diamond the Regale of France, stolen by him from the desecrated shrine of St. Thomas a Becket.

He wears the club-toed shoes, the white shirt embroidered in black
silk, the padded shoulders, and the flat cap by which this reign is
easily remembered.]

There are two distinct classes of fashion to be seen, the German-Swiss fashion and the English fashion, a natural evolution of the national dress. The German fashion is that slashed, extravagant-looking creation which we know so well from the drawings of Albert Duerer and the more German designs of Holbein. The garments which were known as 'blistered' clothes are excessive growths on to the most extravagant designs of the Henry VII. date. The shirt cut low in the neck, and sewn with black embroidery; the little waistcoat ending at the waist and cut straight across from shoulder to shoulder, tied with thongs of leather or coloured laces to the breeches, leaving a gap between which showed the shirt; the universal pouch on the breeches often highly decorated and jewelled. From the line drawings you will see that the sleeves and the breeches took every form, were of any odd assortment of colours, were cut, puffed, and splashed all over, so that the shirt might be pushed through the holes, looking indeed 'blistered.'

The shoes were of many shapes, as I have shown, agreeing in one point only--that the toes should be cut very broad, often, indeed, quite square.

Short or hanging hair, both were the fashion, and little flat caps with the rim cut at intervals, or the large flat hats of the previous reign, covered with feathers and curiously slashed, were worn with these costumes.

Cloaks, as you may see, were worn over the dress, and also those overcoats shaped much like the modern dressing-gown.

It is from these 'blistered,' padded breeches that we derive the trunks of the next reign, the slashings grown into long ribbon-like slits, the hose puffed at the knee.

Separate pairs of sleeves were worn with the waistcoats, or with the petti-cotes, a favourite sleeve trimming being broad velvet bands.

The invention sprang, as usual, from necessity, by vanity to custom. In 1477 the Swiss beat and routed the Duke of Burgundy at Nantes, and the soldiers, whose clothes were in rags, cut and tore up his silk tents, his banners, all material they could find, and made themselves clothes of these odd pieces--clothes still so torn and ragged that their shirts puffed out of every hole and rent. The arrival of the victorious army caused all the non-fighters to copy this curious freak in clothes, and the courtiers perpetuated the event by proclaiming blistering as the fashion.

The other and more usual fashion springs from the habit of clothes in bygone reigns.

Let us first take the shirt A. It will be seen how, in this reign, the tendency of the shirt was to come close about the neck. The previous reign showed us, as a rule, a shirt cut very low in the neck, with the hem drawn together with laces; these laces pulled more tightly together, thus rucking the material into closer gathers, caused the cut of the shirt to be altered and made so that the hem frilled out round the neck--a collar, in fact. That this collar took all forms under certain limitations will be noticed, also that thick necked gentlemen--Henry himself must have invented this--wore the collar of the shirt turned down and tied with strings of linen. The cuffs of the shirt, when they showed at the wrist, were often, as was the collar, sewn with elaborate designs in black thread or silk.

Now we take the waistcoat B. As you may see from the drawing showing the German form of dress, this waistcoat was really a petti-cote, a waistcoat with sleeves. This waistcoat was generally of richly ornamented material (Henry in purple satin, embroidered with his initials and the Tudor rose; Henry in brocade covered with posies made in letters of fine gold bullion). The material was slashed and puffed or plain, and dependent for its effect on the richness of its embroidery or design of the fabric. It was worn with or without sleeves; in most cases the sleeves were detachable.

The coat C. This coat was made with bases like a frock, a skirted coat, in fact; the material used was generally plain, of velvet, fine cloth, silk, or satin. The varieties of cut were numerous, and are shown in the drawings--open to the waist, open all the way in front, close to the neck--every way; where the coat was open in front it generally parted to show the bragetto, or jewelled pouch. It was a matter for choice spirits to decide whether or no they should wear sleeves to their coats, or show the sleeves of their waistcoats. No doubt Madame Fashion saw to it that the changes were rung sufficiently to make hay while the sun shone on extravagant tastes. The coat was held at the waist with a sash of silk tied in a bow with short ends. Towards the end of the reign, foreshadowing the Elizabethan jerkin or jacket, the custom grew more universal of the coat with sleeves and the high neck, the bases were cut shorter to show the full trunks, and the waistcoat was almost entirely done away with, the collar grew in proportion, and spread, like the tail of an angry turkey, in ruffle and folded pleat round the man's neck.

This is the extreme German-English fashion. In Germany and
Switzerland this was carried to greater lengths.]

The overcoat D is the gown of the previous reign cut, for the dandy, into a shorter affair, reaching not far below the knee; for the grave man it remained long, but, for all, the collar had changed to a wide affair stretching well over the shoulders. It was made, this collar, of such stuff as lined the cloak, maybe it was of fur, or of satin, of silk, or of cloth of gold. The tremendous folds of these overcoats gave to the persons in them a sense of splendour and dignity; the short sleeves of the fashionable overcoats, puffed and swollen, barred with rich _applique_ designs or bars of fur, reaching only to the elbow, there to end in a hem of fur or some rich stuff, the collar as wide as these padded shoulders, all told in effect as garments which gave a great air of well-being and richness to their owner.

Of course, I suppose one must explain, the sleeves varied in every way: were long, short, full, medium full, according to taste. Sometimes the overcoats were sleeveless. Beneath these garments the trunks were worn--loose little breeches, which, in the German style, were bagged, puffed, rolled, and slashed in infinite varieties. Let it be noticed that the cutting of slashes was hardly ever a straight slit, but in the curve of an elongated S or a double S curve. Other slashes were squared top and bottom.

All men wore tight hose, in some cases puffed at the knee; in fact, the bagging, sagging, and slashing of hose suggested the separate breeches or trunks of hose.

A plain but rich looking dress. The peculiar head-dress has a pad of
silk in front to hold it from the forehead. The half-sleeves are
well shown.]

The shoes were very broad, and were sometimes stuffed into a mound at the toes, were sewn with precious stones, and, also, were cut and puffed with silk.

The little flat cap will be seen in all its varieties in the drawings.

The Irish were forbidden by law to wear a shirt, smock, kerchor, bendel, neckerchor, mocket (a handkerchor), or linen cap coloured or dyed with saffron; or to wear in shirts or smocks above seven yards of cloth.

To wear black genet you must be royal; to wear sable you must rank above a viscount; to wear marten or velvet trimming you must be worth over two hundred marks a year.

Short hair came into fashion about 1521.

So well known is the story of Sir Philip Calthrop and John Drakes the shoemaker of Norwich, who tried to ape the fashion, that I must here allude to this ancestor of mine who was the first of the dandies of note, among persons not of the royal blood. The story itself, retold in every history of costume, is to this effect: Drakes, the shoemaker, seeing that the county talked of Sir Philip's clothes, ordered a gown from the same tailor. This reached the ears of Sir Philip, who then ordered his gown to be cut as full of slashes as the shears could make it. The ruin of cloth so staggered the shoemaker that he vowed to keep to his own humble fashion in future. No doubt Sir Philip's slashes were cunningly embroidered round, and the gown made rich and sparkling with the device of seed pearls so much in use. This man's son, also Sir Philip, married Amy, daughter of Sir William Boleyn, of Blickling, Norfolk. She was aunt to Queen Anne Boleyn.

THE WOMEN

One cannot call to mind pictures of this time without, in the first instance, seeing the form of Henry rise up sharply before us followed by his company of wives. The fat, uxorious giant comes straight to the front of the picture, he dominates the age pictorially; and, as a fitting background, one sees the six women who were sacrificed on the political altar to pander to his vanity. Katherine of Aragon--the fine and noble lady--a tool of political desires, cast off after Henry had searched his precious conscience, after eighteen years of married life, to find that he had scruples as to the spirituality of the marriage. Anne Boleyn, tainted with the life of the Court, a pitiful figure in spite of all her odious crimes; how often must a ghost, in a black satin nightdress edged with black velvet, have haunted the royal dreams. And the rest of them, clustered round the vain king, while in the background the great figures of the time loom hugely as they play with the crowned puppets.

The note of the time, as we look at it with our eyes keen on the picture, is the final evolution of the hood. Bit by bit, inch by inch, the plain fabric has become enriched, each succeeding step in an elaboration of the simple form; the border next to the face is turned back, then the hood is lined with fine stuff and the turnover shows this to advantage; then the sides are split and the back is made more full; then a tag is sewn on to the sides by which means the cut side may be fastened off the shoulders. The front is now stiffened and shaped at an angle, this front is sewn with jewels, and, as the angle forms a gap between the forehead and the point of the hood, a pad is added to fill in the vacant space. At last one arrives at the diamond-shaped head-dress worn in this reign, and, in this reign, elaborated in every way, elaborated, in fact, out of existence. In order to make the head-dress in its 1509 state you must make the white lining with the jewelled turnover as a separate cap. However, I think that the drawings speak for themselves more plainly than I can write.

Every device for crowding jewels together was used, criss-cross, in groups of small numbers, in great masses. Pendants were worn, hung upon jewelled chains that wound twice round the neck, once close to the neck, the second loop loose and passed, as a rule, under the lawn shift. Large brooches decorated the bodices, brooches with drop ornaments, the body of the brooch of fine gold workmanship, many of them wrought in Italy. The shift, delicately embroidered with black silk, had often a band of jewellery upon it, and this shift was square cut, following the shape of the bodice.

The bodice of the gown was square cut and much stiffened to a box-like shape. The sleeves of the gown were narrow at the shoulders, and after fitting the arm for about six inches down from the shoulders, they widened gradually until, just below the elbow, they became square and very full; in this way they showed the false under-sleeve. This under-sleeve was generally made of a fine rich-patterned silk or brocade, the same stuff which formed the under-gown; the sleeve was a binding for the very full lawn or cambric sleeve which showed in a ruffle at the wrist and in great puffs under the forearm. The under-sleeve was really more like a gauntlet, as it was generally held together by buttoned tags; it was puffed with other coloured silk, slashed to show the shift, or it might be plain.

Now the sleeve of the gown was subject to much alteration. It was, as I have described, made very square and full at the elbow, and over this some ladies wore a false sleeve of gold net--you may imagine the length to which net will go, studied with jewels, crossed in many ways, twisted into patterns, sewn on to the sleeve in sloping lines--but, besides this, the sleeve was turned back to form a deep square cuff which was often made of black or coloured velvet, or of fur.

In all this I am taking no account of the German fashions, which I must describe separately. Look at the drawings I have made of the German fashion. I find that they leave me dumb--mere man has but a limited vocabulary when the talk comes to clothes--and these dresses that look like silk pumpkins, blistered and puffed and slashed, sewn in ribs, swollen, and altogether so queer, are beyond the furious dashes that my pen makes at truth and millinery. The costumes of the people of this age have grown up in the minds of most artists as being inseparable from the drawings of Holbein and Duerer.

Surely, I say to myself, most people who will read this will know their Holbein and Duerer, between whom there lies a vast difference, but who between them show, the one, the estate of England, and the other, those most German fashions which had so powerful an influence upon our own. Both these men show the profusion of richness, the extravagant follies of the dress of their time, how, to use the words of Pliny: 'We penetrate into the bowels of the earth, digging veins of gold and silver, and ores of brass and lead; we seek also for gems and certain little pebbles. Driving galleries into the depths, we draw out the bowels of the earth, that the gems we seek may be worn on the finger. How many hands are wasted in order that a single joint may sparkle! If any hell there were, it had assuredly ere now been disclosed by the borings of avarice and luxury!'

Notice the wide cuffs covered with gold network, and the rich panel
of the under-skirt.]

Or in the writings of Tertullian, called by Sigismund Feyerabendt, citizen and printer of Frankfort, a 'most strict censor who most severely blames women:' 'Come now,' says Tertullian, 'if from the first both the Milesians sheared sheep, and the Chinese spun from the tree, and the Tyrians dyed and the Phrygians embroidered, and the Babylonians inwove; and if pearls shone and rubies flashed, if gold itself, too, came up from the earth with the desire for it; and if now, too, no lying but the mirror's were allowed, Eve, I suppose, would have desired these things on her expulsion from Paradise, and when spiritually dead.'

One sees by the tortured and twisted German fashion that the hair was plaited, and so, in curves and twists, dropped into coarse gold-web nets, thrust into web nets with velvet pouches to them, so that the hair stuck out behind in a great knob, or at the side in two protuberances; over all a cap like to the man's, but that it was infinitely more feathered and jewelled. Then, again, they wore those hideous barbes or beard-like linen cloths, over the chin, and an infinite variety of caps of linen upon their heads--caps which showed always the form of the head beneath.

In common with the men, their overcoats and cloaks were voluminous, and needed to be so if those great sleeves had to be stuffed into them; fur collars or silk collars, with facings to match, were rolled over to show little or great expanses of these materials.

Here, to show what dainty creatures were our lady ancestors, to show from what beef and blood and bone we come, I give you (keep your eye meanwhile upon the wonderful dresses) the daily allowance of a Maid of Honour.

Every morning at breakfast one chyne of beef from the
kitchen, one chete loaf and one maunchet at the pantry
bar, and one gallon of ale at the buttery bar.

For dinner a piece of beef, a stroke of roast and a
reward from the kitchen. A caste of chete bread from the
pantry bar, and a gallon of ale at the buttery bar.

Afternoon--should they suffer the pangs of hunger--a
maunchet of bread from the pantry bar, and a gallon of
ale at the buttery bar.

Supper, a messe of pottage, a piece of mutton and a
reward from the kitchen. A caste of chete bread from the
pantry bar, and a gallon of ale at the buttery bar.

After supper--to insure a good night's rest--a chete
loaf and a maunchet from the pantry bar, and half a
gallon of ale from the seller bar.

Four and a half gallons of ale! I wonder did they drink it all themselves? All this, and down in the mornings in velvets and silks, with faces as fresh as primroses.

It is the fate of all articles of clothing or adornment, naturally tied or twisted, or folded and pinned by the devotees of fashion, to become, after some little time, made up, ready made, into the shapes which had before some of the owner's mood and personality about them. These hoods worn by the women, these wide sleeves to the gowns, these hanging sleeves to the overcoats, the velvet slip of under-dress, all, in their time, became falsified into ready-made articles. With the hoods you can see for yourselves how they lend themselves by their shape to personal taste; they were made up, all ready sewn; where pins had been used, the folds of velvet at the back were made steadfast, the crimp of the white linen was determined, the angle of the side-flap ruled by some unwritten law of mode. In the end, by a process of evolution, the diamond shape disappeared, and the cap was placed further back on the head, the contour being circular where it had previously been pointed. The velvet hanging-piece remained at the back of the head, but was smaller, in one piece, and was never pinned up, and the entire shape gradually altered towards, and finally into, the well-known Mary Queen of Scots head-dress, with which every reader must be familiar.

It has often occurred to me while writing this book that the absolute history of one such head-dress would be of more help than these isolated remarks, which have to be dropped only to be taken up in another reign, but I have felt that, after all, the arrangement is best as it stands, because we can follow, if we are willing, the complete wardrobe of one reign into the next, without mixing the two up. It is difficult to keep two interests running together, but I myself have felt, when reading other works on the subject, that the way in which the various articles of clothing are mixed up is more disturbing than useful.

The wide sleeve to the gown, once part and parcel of the gown, was at last made separate from it--as a cuff more than a sleeve naturally widening--and in the next reign, among the most fashionable, left out altogether. The upper part of the dress, once cut low and square to show the under-dress, or a vest of other stuff, was now made, towards the end of the reign, with a false top of other stuff, so replacing the under-dress.

Lacing was carried to extremes, so that the body was pinched into the hard roll-like appearance always identified with this time; on the other hand, many, wiser women I should say, were this the place for morals, preferred to lace loose, and show, beneath the lacing, the colour of the under-dress.

Many were the varieties of girdle and belt, from plain silk sashes with tasselled ends to rich jewelled chain girdles ending in heavy ornaments.

For detail one can do no better than go to Holbein, the master of detail, and to-day, when photographs of pictures are so cheap, and lives of painters, copiously illustrated, are so easily attainable at low prices, it is the finest education, not only in painting, but in Tudor atmosphere and in matters of dress, to go straightway and study the master--that master who touched, without intention, on the moral of his age when he painted a miniature of the Blessed Thomas More on the back of a playing card.

EDWARD THE SIXTH

Reigned six years: 1547-1553.

Born, 1537.

THE MEN AND WOMEN

Here we have a reign which, from its very shortness, can hardly be expected to yield us much in the way of change, yet it shows, by very slight movements, that form of growth which preludes the great changes to come.

I think I may call a halt here, and proceed to tell you why this volume is commenced with Henry VII., called the Tudor and Stuart volume, and ends with the Cromwells. It is because, between these reigns, the tunic achieves maturity, becomes a doublet, and dies, practically just in the middle of the reign of Charles II. of pungent memory. The peculiar garment, or rather, this garment peculiar to a certain time, runs through its various degrees of cut. It is, at first, a loose body garment with skirts; the skirts become arranged in precise folds, the folds on the skirt are shortened, the shorter they become the tighter becomes the coat; then we run through with this coat in its periods of puffings, slashings, this, that, and the other sleeve, all coats retaining the small piece of skirt or basque, and so to the straight, severe Cromwellian jerkin with the piece of skirt cut into tabs, until the volume ends, and hey presto! there marches into history a Persian business--a frock coat, straight, trim, quite a near cousin to our own garment of afternoon ceremony.

For a sign of the times it may be mentioned that a boy threw his cap at the Host just at the time of the Elevation.

To Queen Elizabeth has been given the palm for the wearing of the first silk stockings in England, but it is known that Sir Thomas Gresham gave a pair of silk stockings to Edward VI.

We now see a more general appearance in the streets of the flat cap upon the heads of citizens. The hood, that eminently practical head-gear, took long to die, and, when at last it went out of fashion, except among the labouring classes, there came in the cap that now remains to us in the cap of the Beefeaters at the Tower of London.

It is the time of jerkin or jacket, doublet or coat, and hose--generally worn with trunks, which were puffed, short knickerbockers.

The flat cap, afterwards the statute cap as ordered by Elizabeth, became, as I say, the ordinary head-wear, though some, no doubt, kept hoods upon their heavy travelling cloaks. This cap, which some of the Bluecoat Boys still wear, was enforced upon the people by Elizabeth for the encouragement of the English trade of cappers. 'One cap of wool, knit, thicked, and dressed in England,' was to be worn by all over six years of age, except such persons as had 'twenty marks by year in lands, and their heirs, and such as have borne office of worship.'

Edward, according to the portraits, always wore a flat cap, the base of the crown ornamented with bands of jewels.

The Bluecoat Boys, and long may they have the sense to keep to their dress, show us exactly the ordinary dress of the citizen, except that the modern knickerbocker has taken the place of the trunks. Also, the long skirts of these blue coats were, in Edward's time, the mark of the grave man, others wore these same skirts cut to the knee.

That peculiar fashion of the previous reign--the enormously broad-shouldered appearance--still held in this reign to some extent, though the collars of the jerkins, or, as one may more easily know them, overcoats or jackets, open garments, were not so wide, and allowed more of the puffed shoulder of the sleeve to show. Indeed, the collar became quite small, as in the Windsor Holbein painting of Edward, and the puff in the shoulders not so rotund.

The doublet of this reign shows no change, but the collar of the shirt begins to show signs of the ruff of later years. It is no larger, but is generally left untied with the ornamental strings hanging.

Antiquarian research has, as it often does, muddled us as to the meaning of the word 'partlet.' Fairholt, who is very good in many ways, puts down in his glossary, 'Partlet: A gorget for women.' Then he goes on to say that a partlet may be goodness knows what else. Minshein says they are 'part of a man's attire, as the loose collar of a doublet, to be set on or taken off by itself, without the bodies, as the picadillies now a daies, or as mens' bands, or womens' neckerchiefs, which are in some, or at least have been within memorie, called partlets.'

Sir F. Madden says: 'The partlet evidently appears to have been the corset or habit-shirt worn at that period, and which so commonly occurs in the portraits of the time, generally made of velvet and ornamented with precious stones.'

The change from the dress of the previous reign should be easily
noticed, especially in the case of the woman. This dress is, of
course, of the plainest in this time.]

Hall, the author of 'Satires,' 1598, speaks of a man, an effeminate dandy, as wearing a partlet strip. It appears to me, who am unwillingly forced into judging between so many learned persons, that, from all I have been able to gather from contemporary records and papers, the partlet is indeed, as Minshein says, 'the loose collar of a doublet,' in reality the same thing as a shirt band.

Henry VIII. wore a band about his neck, the forerunner of the ruff. Some of his bands were of silver cloth with ruffs to them, others, as I have shown, were wonderfully embroidered.

In this case, then, the partlet is head of the family tree to our own collar, 'to be set on or taken off by itself,' and so by way of ruff, valued at threescore pound price apiece, to plain bands, to falling bands, laced neckcloth, stock--to the nine pennyworth of misery we bolt around our necks.

Dress, on the whole, is much plainer, sleeves are not so full of cuts and slashes, and they fit more closely to the arm. The materials are rich, but the ornament is not so lavish; the portrait of Edward by Gwillim Stretes is a good example of ornament, rich but simple. Shoes are not cut about at the toe quite with the same splendour, but are still broad in the toe.

For the women, it may be said that the change towards simplicity is even more marked. The very elaborate head-dress, the folded, diamond-shaped French hood has disappeared almost entirely, and, for the rich, the half hoop, set back from the forehead with a piece of velvet or silk to hang down the back, will best describe the head-gear. From that to the centre-pointed hoop shows the trend of the shape. This latest form of woman's head apparel was born, I think, out of the folds of the linen cap worn in the house, and this, being repeated in the velvet night-caps, became the extreme of fashion. The drawing will show how the square end of the linen cap, falling in the centre of the circular cap-shape, cut the semicircle and overlapped it, thus giving the appearance later to become exaggerated into a form cut especially to that shape. (I try to be as lucid as I can manage, but the difficulties of describing such evolutions in any but tangled language I leave the reader to imagine.)

The women are also wearing cloth hoods, rather baggy cap-like hoods, with a hanging-piece behind.

The most notable change is the collar of the gown, which suddenly springs into existence. It is a high collar and very open in front, showing a piece of the under-dress. On this collar is sewn--what I shall call--the woman's partlet, as the embroidery is often detachable and answers the same purpose as the man's partlet; this later became a separate article, and was under-propped with wires to hold it out stiffly.

The same stiff-bodied appearance holds good, but in more simple dresses the skirts were not quite as voluminous as heretofore.

With overcoats in general the hanging sleeve is being worn, the arm of the wearer coming out just below the puffed shoulder-piece.

With these remarks we may safely go on to the reign of Mary; another reign which does not yield us much in the way of clothes.

MARY

Reigned five years: 1553-1558.

Born, 1516. Married, 1554, Philip of Spain.

THE MEN AND WOMEN

I cannot do better than commence this chapter by taking you back to the evening of August 3, 1553. Mary, with her half-sister Elizabeth, entered London on this date. At Aldgate she was met by the Mayor of London, who gave her the City sword. From the Antiquarian Repertory comes this account:

'First, the citizens' children walked before her
magnificently dressed; after followed gentlemen habited
in velvets of all sorts, some black, others in white,
yellow, violet, and carnation; others wore satins or
taffety, and some damasks of all colours, having plenty
of gold buttons; afterwards followed the Mayor, with the
City Companies, and the chiefs or masters of the several
trades; after them, the Lords, richly habited, and the
most considerable knights; next came the ladies, married
and single, in the midst of whom was the Queen herself,
mounted on a small white ambling nag, the housings of
which were fringed with gold thread; about her were six
lacqueys, habited in vests of gold.

'The Queen herself was dressed in violet velvet, and was
then about forty years of age, and rather fresh
coloured.

'Before her were six lords bareheaded, each carrying in
his hand a yellow mace, and some others bearing the arms
and crown. Behind her followed the archers, as well of
the first as the second guard.

'She was followed by her sister, named Madame Elizabeth,
in truth a beautiful Princess, who was also accompanied
by ladies both married and single.'

In the crowds about the city waiting to stare at the new Queen as she passed by, one could recognise the various professions by their colours. The trained bands in white doublets with the City arms before and behind; lawyers in black; sheriffs and aldermen in furred gowns with satin sleeves; citizens in brown cloaks and workers in cloth or leather doublets; citizens' servants in blue liveries; gentlemen's servants in very gorgeous liveries of their masters' colours. Here is a description of a gentleman's page and his clothes:

'One doublet of yelow million fustian, th'one halfe
buttoned with peche-colour buttons, and the other half
laced downwards; one payer of peche-colour, laced with
smale tawnye lace; a graye hat with a copper edge rounde
about it, with a band p'cell of the same hatt; a payer
of watchet (blue) stockings. Likewise he hath twoe
clokes, th'one of vessey colour, garded with twoe yards
of black clothe and twisted lace of carnacion colour,
and lyned with crymsone bayes; and th'other is a red
shipp russet colour, striped about th'cape and down the
fore face, twisted with two rows of twisted lace, russet
and gold buttons afore and uppon the shoulder, being of
the clothe itself, set with the said twisted lace and
the buttons of russet silk and gold.'

This will give some notion of the elaborate liveries worn, and also it will show how, having understood the forms of the garments and the material which may be used, the rest, ornament and fancy, depend on the sense of the reader.

A change has come over the streets, the town is full of Spaniards come over with Philip, and these bring with them many innovations in dress. The most noticeable is the high-peaked Spanish hat, a velvet bag with a narrow brim, worn on one side of the head. There is, also, a hard-crowned hat, round the crown-base of which is a gold cord clasped by a jewel; a feather is stuck into this hat. Yet the mass of citizens wear the flat cap, some of them, the older men, have a coif tied under their chins, and over this the flat cap. Again, older men wear black velvet skull caps.

With these Spaniards comes, also, the first appearance of the ruff, very neat and small.

Although the overcoats of Henry's and Edward's reigns still form the principal wear, the short Spanish cloak has come in, cut in full folds, and reaching not far below the waist. They also brought in the cloak with a turned up high collar; and some had sleeves to their cloaks.

The half-way between the dress of 1530 and 1560. A cloak very much
of the period, and a tunic in the state of evolution towards the
doublet.]

One sees more beards and moustaches, short clipped beards, and beards with two points.

Shoes are now more to the shape of the foot, and high boots strapped up over the knee, also half-boots with the tops turned over to be seen. Often, where the hose meet the trunks, these are turned down.

The doublets become shaped more closely to the body, all showing the gradual change towards the Elizabethan costume, but still retaining the characteristics of earlier times, as the long skirt to the doublet, and the opening to show the collar of the shirt, or partlet strip.

Ladies now show more hair, parted, as before, in the centre, but now puffed out at the sides.

The new shape of head-dress becomes popular, and the upstanding collar to the gown is almost universal.

The gowns themselves, though retaining the same appearance as before, full skirts, no trains, big sleeves, and split to show the under-gown, have the top part of the gown covering the bosom made of a separate material, as, for instance, a gown of fine cloth will have collar and yoke of velvet.

Women wear neat linen caps, made very plain and close to the head, with small ear-pieces.

On the shoulders there is a fashion of wearing kerchiefs of linen or silk, white as a rule; white, in fact, is frequently used for dresses, both for men and women.

The custom of carrying small posies of flowers comes in, and it is interesting to see the Queen, in her portrait by Antonio More, carrying a bunch of violets arranged exactly as the penny bunches sold now in our streets.

There was, in most dresses, a great profusion of gold buttons, and the wearing of gold chains was common--in fact, a gold chain about the neck for a man, and a gold chain girdle for a woman, were part of the ordinary everyday dress.

You will realize that to one born in the reign of Henry VIII. the appearance of people now was very different, and, to anyone as far away as we are now, the intervening reigns of Edward and Mary are interesting as showing the wonderful quiet change that could take place in those few years, and alter man's exterior from the appearance of a playing-card, stiff, square, blob-footed, to the doublet and hose person with a cart-wheel of a ruff, which recalls to us Elizabethan dress.

The habit of wearing flowers in the opening of the dress was
frequent at this time, was, in fact, begun about this reign. One can
easily see in this dress the ground-work of the Elizabethan fashion,
the earliest of which was an exaggeration of this costume.]

ELIZABETH

Reigned 45 years: 1558-1603.

THE MEN

Here we are in the middle of great discoveries with adventurers, with Calvin and Michael Angelo, living and dying, and Galileo and Shakespeare seeing light--in the very centre and heart of these things, and we and they discussing the relations of the law to linen. How, they and we ask, are breeches, and slop-hose cut in panes, to be lined? In such writings we are bound to concern ourselves with the little things that matter, and in this reign we meet a hundred little things, little fussy things, the like of which we leave alone to-day. But this is not quite true. To-day a man, whether he cares to admit it or no, is for ever choosing patterns, colours, shades, styles to suit his own peculiar personality. From the cradle to the grave we are decked with useless ornaments--bibs, sashes, frills, little jackets, neat ties, different coloured boots, clothes of ceremony, clothes supposed to be in harmony with the country, down, at last, to the clothes of an old gentleman, keeping a vague reminder of twenty, thirty years ago in their style, and then--grave clothes.

How well we know the Elizabethan! He is a stock figure in our imagination; he figured in our first schoolboy romances, he strutted in the first plays we saw. Because it was an heroic time we hark back to it to visualize it as best we may so that we can come nearer to our heroes--Drake, Raleigh, and the rest. The very names of the garments arouse associations--ruff, trunks, jumper, doublet, jerkin, cloak, bone-bobbin lace, and lace of Flanders--they almost take one's breath away.

Here comes a gentleman in a great ruff, yellow-starched, an egg-shaped pearl dangles from one ear. One hand rests on his padded hip, the other holds a case of toothpicks and a napkin; he is going to his tavern to dine. His doublet is bellied like a pea's cod, and his breeches are bombasted, his little hat is stuck on one side and the feather in it curls over the brim. His doublet is covered with a herring-bone pattern in silk stitches, and is slashed all over. He is exaggerated, monstrous; he is tight-laced; his trunks stick out a foot all round him, and his walk is, in consequence, a little affected; but, for all that, he is a gallant figure.

Behind him comes a gentleman in loose knee-breeches barred with velvet; at the knee he has a frill of lace. His jerkin is not stuffed out, and his ruff is not starched to stick up round his head. His hair is cut in three points, one over each ear and the third over the centre of his forehead, where we see a twisted lock tied with ribbon. We seem to know these people well--very well. The first, whose clothes are of white silk sewn with red and blue, whose trunk hose have clocks of silk sewn on them, reminds us of whom? And the second gentleman in green and red, with heels of red on his shoes? Suddenly there flashes across our memory the picture of a lighted stage, a row of shops, a policeman, and then a well-known voice calling, 'Hello, Joey, here we are again!'

Here we are again after all these centuries--clown and pantaloon, the rustic with red health on his face, the old man in Venetian slops--St. Pantaloone--just as Elizabethan, humour included, as anything can well be.

Then, enter Harlequin in his clothes of gorgeous patches; the quick, almost invisible thief, the instigator of all the evil and magic. His patches and rags have grown to symmetrical pattern, his loose doublet has become this tight-fitting lizard skin of flashing gold and colours, but his atmosphere recalls the great days.

To these enter 1830--Columbine--an early Victorian lady, who contrives to look sweetly modest in the shortest and frilliest of skirts; she looks like a rose, a rose on two pink stalks. She, being so different, gives the picture just the air of magic incongruity. Once, years ago, she was dressed in rags like Harlequin, but I suppose that the age of sentiment clothed her in her ballet costume rather than see her in her costly tatters.

We are a conservative nation, and we like our own old jokes so much that we have kept through the ages this extraordinary pleasing entertainment straight down, clothes and all, from the days of Queen Elizabeth.

Even as we dream of this, and the harlequinade dazzles our eyes, the dream changes--a new sound is heard, a sound from the remote past, too. We listen eagerly, clown, pantaloon, harlequin, and columbine vanish to the sound of the pan-pipes and the voice of Punch.

'Root-ti-toot, rootity-toot!' There, by the corner of the quiet square, is a tall box covered with checkered cloth. Above a man's height is an opening, and on a tiny stage are two figures, one in a doublet stiffened out like a pea pod, with a ruff hanging loose about his neck, bands at his wrists, a cap on his head--Punch. The other with a linen cap and a ruff round her neck--Judy. Below, on the ground by the gentleman who bangs a drum and blows on the pan-pipes stuck in his muffler, is a dog with a ruff round his neck--Toby. And we know--delightful to think of it--that a box hidden by the check covering, contains many curiously dressed figures--all friends of ours. The world is certainly curious, and I suppose that an Elizabethan revisiting us to-day would find but one thing the same, the humour of the harlequinade and the Punch and Judy show.

Now let us get to the dull part. If you wish to swim in a sea of allusions there are a number of books into which you may dive--

'Microcynicon.'

'Pleasant Quippes for Upstart Newfangled Gentlewomen.'

Hall's 'Satires.'

Stubbes' 'Anatomie of Abuses.'

'The Cobbler's Prophesie.'

'The Debate between Pride and Lowliness.'

'The Letting of Humours Blood in the Head Vaine.'

'The Wits Nurserie.'

Euphues' 'Golden Legacie.'

'Every Man out of his Humour.'

If you do not come out from these saturated with detail then you will never absorb anything.

For the shapes, the doublet was a close-fitting garment, cut, if in the Italian fashion, down to a long peak in front. They were made without sleeves, like a waistcoat, and an epaulette overhung the armhole. The sleeves were tied into the doublet by means of points (ribbons with metal tags). These doublets were for a long time stuffed or bombasted into the form known as 'pea's cod bellied' or 'shotten-bellied.'

The jerkin was a jacket with sleeves, and was often worn over the doublet. The sleeves of the jerkin were often open from shoulder to wrist to show the doublet sleeve underneath. These sleeves were very wide, and were ornamented with large buttons.

The jornet was a loose travelling cloak.

The jumper a loose jerkin, worn for comfort or extra clothing in winter.

Both doublet and jerkin had a little skirt or base.

The very wide breeches known as trunks were worn by nearly everybody in the early part of the reign, until they vied with Venetian breeches for fashion. They were sometimes made of a series of wide bands of different colours placed alternately; sometimes they were of bands, showing the stuffed trunk hose underneath. They were stuffed with anything that came handy--wool, rags, or bran--and were of such proportions that special seats were put in the Houses of Parliament for the gentlemen who wore them. The fashion at its height appears to have lasted about eight years.

He wears a double linen collar, nearly as usual at this time as
the ruff. His trunk hose will be seen through the openings of his
trunks. His boots are held up by two leather straps. His cloak is
an Italian fashion.]

The Venetian breeches were very full at the top and narrowed to the knee; they were slashed and puffed, or paned like lattice windows with bars of coloured stuffs or gold lace.

The French breeches were tight and ruffled in puffs about the thighs.

The stockings were of yarn, or silk, or wool. They were gartered about the knee, and pulled up over the breeches; but the man most proud of his leg wore no garters, but depended on the shape of his leg and the fit of his stocking to keep the position. These stockings were sewn with clocks at the ankles, and had various patterns on them, sometimes of gold or silver thread. Openwork stockings were known.

The stockings and breeches were called, if the breeches were short and the stockings all the way up the leg, trunk hose and trunks; if the breeches came to the knee and the stockings just came over them, they were known as upper stocks and nether stocks.

The shoes were shaped to the foot, and made of various leathers or stuffs; a rose of ribbon sometimes decorated the shoes. There were shoes with high cork soles called moyles. Of course, there were gallants who did things no one else thought of doing--wearing very square-toed shoes, for instance, or cock feathers in their hair.

The sturtops were boots to the ankle.

As for the hair, we have the love-lock tied with ribbons, the very same that we see caricatured in the wigs of clown and pantaloon. We have, also, hair left fairly long and brushed straight back from the forehead, and short-cropped hair. Beards and moustaches are worn by most.

They wore little cloaks covered with embroidery, lace, sometimes even with pearls. For winter or for hard travelling the jornet or loose cloak was worn.

The older and more sedate wore long stuff gowns with hanging sleeves; these gowns, made to fit at the waist and over the trunks, gave an absurd Noah's ark-like appearance to the wearers. Those who cared nothing for the fashions left their gowns open and wore them loose.

The common people wore simple clothes of the same cut as their lords--trunks or loose trousers, long hose, and plain jerkins or doublets. In the country the fashions alter, as a rule, but little; however, in this reign Corydon goes to meet Sylvia in somewhat fashionable clothes. Lodge says: 'His holiday suit marvellous seemly, in a russet jacket, welted with the same, and faced with red worsted, having a pair of blue camblet sleeves, bound at the wrists with four yellow laces, closed before very richly with a dozen pewter buttons. His hose of gray kersey, with a large slop barred all across the pocket holes with three fair guards, stitched on either side with red thread.' His stockings are also gray kersey, tied with different coloured laces; his bonnet is green, and has a copper brooch with the picture of St. Dennis. 'And to want nothing that might make him amorous in his old days, he had a fair shirt-band of white lockeram, whipt over with Coventry blue of no small cost.'

The hats worn vary in shape from steeple-crowned, narrow-brimmed hats, to flat, broad-crowned hats; others show the coming tendency towards the broad-brimmed Jacobean hat. Round these hats were hatbands of every sort, gold chains, ruffled lace, silk or wool.

I think we may let these gallants rest now to walk among the shades--a walking geography of clothes they are, with French doublets, German hose, Spanish hats and cloaks, Italian ruffs, Flemish shoes; and these with chalked faces, fuzzed periwigs of false hair, partlet strips, wood busks to keep straight slim waists, will make the shades laugh perhaps, or perhaps only sigh, for there are many in that dim wardrobe of fashions who are still more foolish, still more false, than these Elizabethans.

THE WOMEN

Now this is the reign of the ruff and the monstrous hoop and the wired hair. As a companion to her lord, who came from the hands of his barber with his hair after the Italian manner, short and round and curled in front and frizzed, or like a Spaniard, long hair at his ears curled at the two ends, or with a French love-lock dangling down his shoulders, she--his lady--sits under the hands of her maid, and tries various attires of false _hair_, principally of a yellow colour. Every now and again she consults the looking-glass hanging on her girdle; sometimes she dresses her hair with chains of gold, from which jewels or gold-work tassels hang; sometimes she, too, allows a love-lock to rest upon her shoulder, or fall negligently on her ruff.

Even the country girl eagerly waits for news of the town fashions, and follows them as best she may.

In the early part of the reign the simple costume of the previous reign was still worn, and even the court ladies were quietly, though richly, dressed.

In the first two years the ruff remained a fairly small size, and was made of holland, which remained stiff, and held the folds well; but later, there entered several Dutch ladies, headed by Mistress Dingham Vander Plasse, of Flanders, in 1564, who taught her pupils the art of starching cambric, and the art of folding, cutting, and pinching ruffs at five pounds a head, and the art of making starch, at the price of one pound.

First, the lady put on her underpropper of wire and holland, and then she would place with a great nicety her ruff of lace, or linen, or cambric. One must understand that the ruff may be great or small, that only the very fashionable wore such a ruff as required an underpropper, and that the starched circular ruff would stand by itself without the other appliance.