Distinction in dress, it will be remembered, was not allowed by More in his Utopia. “All the island over,” he says, “they make their own clothes, without any other distinction than that which is necessary for marking the difference between the two sexes, and the married and unmarried. The fashion never alters; and as it is not ungrateful nor uneasy, so it is fitted for their climate, and calculated both for their summers and winters. Every family makes their own clothes; but all among them, women as well as men, learn one or other of the trades formerly mentioned.” A costume suitable for all conditions of the seasons, were a consummation that will long be among the things to be devoutly wished for, and never attained.
It was once the fashion to wear coats, the material for which had not long before been on the back of the sheep. For rapidity of work in this way, I know nothing that can compete with the achievement of Coxeter of Greenham Mills, near Newbury. He had a couple of South Down sheep shorn at his factory, at five o’clock in the morning; the wool thus produced was put through the usual processes; and by a quarter past six in the evening, it resulted in a complete damson-coloured coat, which was worn at an evening party, by Sir John Throckmorton. A wager for a thousand guineas was won by this feat, with three-quarters of an hour to spare. The sheep were roasted whole, and devoured at a splendid banquet. In one day they afforded comfort to both the inner and outward man.
We have often been told, that “Beauty, when unadorned, is adorned the most;” and there is much truth in that wholesome apothegm. Beauty indeed needs to be dressed; but Prudence should be her handmaiden. In illustration of the excellence of this counsel, I may quote what happened to two young ladies and one lover in the days of chivalry.
In those days there lived an old noble, rich in two daughters, and in nought besides. Of these, he promised one to a young knight, who was wealthy and idle, and who—strange characteristic of young and gallant knight!—was well content to be saved the trouble of wooing.
On a certain fine morning the sire made the same announcement to his girls which the father of Dinah made to that now celebrated and unhappy young lady,—namely, the necessity of decking themselves in their most seductive array, as there was a lover on the road who would dine with them that day. Now, if the morning was fine, there was also an eager and a nipping air abroad; but the elder of the two damsels, disregarding the temperature, and thinking only how best to display her slender waist and graceful shape, put on a “cote hardie;” and in this close-fitting garment, without an inch of fur to lend it warmth, she accompanied her sister to the portal, to bid welcome to the lover, looking for a lady of his love. But that sister was attired with reference to the condition of the thermometer, if her father had one, which is exceedingly doubtful. She was warmly clad; and if her figure was concealed by her mantle, the result of such covering was, that her young blood, in circulating, left a rose upon her cheeks, and did not fix itself, in obstinate stagnation, as in her more airy sister’s case, on the tip of the nose.
Now a red nose is not fascinating; and the knight’s choice was soon made. He gave his hand to the maiden who had shown most sense in the choice of attire, and a very merry wedding was the speedy consequence. As for what turned up in the way of further results, it was, I believe, chiefly the nose of the unsuccessful candidate, which became “retroussé en permanence”. The moral of the tale is respectfully recommended to the notice of all young ladies who seek to catch ardent knights on wintry mornings.
If the men in the days of Edward III. wore “tails behind,” as well as beards before, the ladies were not behind them in extravagance—in tails; and indeed in other matters. For a lady to ride on a palfrey, and not on a charger, would have been considered as derogatory as for a bridesmaid, in our days, to “spoil her prospects” by going to a wedding in a one-horse fly. The damsels of this age very much affected the dress of the men, and we have seen the same affectation in our own time; and this fashion was pushed to such an extreme, that they even carried two tiny daggers in the pouches of their embroidered zones. Their head-dress still lingers among the female peasantry of Normandy, and may be recognized in the species of mitre cap, of enormous height, from the summit of which streamers float in the air like pennants from the masts of some “tall amiral.” It may be added, that if, in many respects, the dresses of the women resembled those of the men, their deeds, too, were like theirs; and these were often (like the dresses) none of the cleanest.
We will discuss the progress of these matters in a new chapter.