I am trusting that the drawings will supply what my words have failed to picture, and I again—for the twenty-first time—repeat that, given the cut and the idea of the time, the student has always to realize that there can be no hard-and-fast rule about the fashions; with the shape he can take liberties up to the points shown, with colour he can do anything—patterns of the materials are obtainable, and Hogarth will give anything required in detail.
GEORGE THE THIRD
Reigned sixty years: 1760-1820.
Born 1738. Married, 1761, Charlotte Sophia of Mecklenburg-Strelitz.
THE MEN AND WOMEN
Throughout this long reign the changes of costume are so frequent, so varied, and so jumbled together, that any precise account of them would be impossible. I have endeavoured to give a leading example of most kind of styles in the budget of drawings which goes with this chapter.
Details concerning this reign are so numerous: Fashion books, fashion articles in the London Magazine, the St. James’s Chronicle, works innumerable on hair-dressing, tailors’ patterns—these are easily within the reach of those who hunt the second-hand shops, or are within reasonable distance of a library.