Turning from headgear to hairdressing, we find Punch a vigilant critic of coiffure. In 1858 he attacks the vagaries of mode as shown in hairdressing à la Chinoise "pulled up by the roots," and the fashion of wearing coins. To judge from Leech's pictures he greatly preferred the simpler style of braids and hair nets. The great event of the mid-'sixties, however, was the advent of the chignon, which proved only second to the crinoline as an incentive to caricature and criticism. In the ironical verses addressed to a "Young Lady of Fashion," the chignon stands first in the list of the artificial enhancements of beauty resorted to half a century back:—
I love thee for thy chignon, for the boss of purchased hair,
Which thou hast on thine occiput the charming taste to wear.
Oh, what a grace that ornament unto thy poll doth lend,
Wound on what seems a curtain-rod with knobs at either end!
I love thee for the roses, purchased too, thy cheeks that deck,
The lilies likewise that adorn thy pearly-powdered neck,
And all that sweet "illusion" that, o'er thy features spread,
Improves the poor reality of Nature's white and red.
I love thee for the muslin and the gauze about thee bound,