has preserved them as a part of the court dress; and of late years they have appeared a little in private society. They are generally, though not always, worn when a prince of the royal family is of the party; and at the king's private parties, although the rest of the dress be that usually worn, buckles are almost indispensable. Knee-strings came in with shoe-strings, and have had about the same vogue. We e see in the great roses worn by peers and knights of the orders with their robes, the fashion of shoe and garter knots, which were common in the reigns of Charles II. and Louis XIV.

Baits.—Bull and bear baiting are well-known amusements; but in Evelyn's Memoirs, vol. i. p. 408, he tells us that

A very gallant horse was baited to death by dogs; but he fought them all, - so as the fiercest of them could not fasten on him till they (the assistants) ran him through with their swords. This wicked and barbarous sport should have been punished on the contrivers of it, to get money under pretence that the horse had killed a man; which was false.

Cloaks.-After being out of fashion for near a century, cloaks are come a little into fashion again (1822). For officers in the army they are better than great coats, as the latter spoil the epaulets and lace; but for common life they are cumbrous and more expensive. I do not think the fashion will last. It is said that when the common Irish wish to excite a quarrel in a fair, one of them drags a cloak or coat along the ground as a signal of defiance (Edgeworth). This practice is of older date and higher origin than may be supposed. Sandras de Courtiez, in his Mẻmoires du Compte de Rochefort, states that one of the unbecoming follies of the Duke of Orleans was that he took pleasure “à tirex les manteaux sur le Pont Neuf." This probably means that his royal highness amused himself in stealing cloaks, but the practices were probably originally the same.

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Visiting Cards.-About six or eight years ago a house in Dean Street, Soho, was repaired (I think No. 79), and, on re

moving a marble chimney-piece in the front drawing-room, four or five visiting cards were found, one with the name of Isaac Newton on it. The names were all written on the back of common playing cards. Hogarth's "Marriage à-la-Mode," plate iv., supplies an additional proof of playing cards having done duty as visiting cards and cards of invitation during the middle of the last century. There are several lying on the floor, in the righthand corner of the picture. One is inscribed-" Count Basset begs to no how Lade Squander sleapt last nite."

Vails to Servants.-The old and expensive custom of "vailsgiving" received its death-blow at Newcastle House. Sir Timothy Waldo, on his way from the Duke's dinner table to his carriage, put a crown into the hand of the cook, who returned it, saying, "Sir, I do not take silver." "Don't you, indeed?" said Sir Timothy, putting it in his pocket; "then I do not give gold.” Hanway's "Eight Letters to the Duke of," had their origin in Sir Timothy's complaint.-Cunningham's London.

Coats. Full dress coats have no capes nor cuffs, morning or riding coats had; whence are derived the ordinary coat now worn all through Europe called frocks, and all uniforms. The full dress was made to fit, but the riding dress was loose, and long in the collar and arms to protect the neck and wrists. When the weather was fine, or that the wearer came into a house, he doubled down his cape and doubled up his cuffs; and as in those days the coats were lined with different colored stuffs, the color of the lining became the color of the cape and cuffs. Uniforms had the same origin, the facings, as they are called, being only the old linings. This is still preserved in the French word revers, which is more correct than our word facing; though that also, if well considered, has the same meaning; for it was the custom to face the breasts of coats with a slip of lining, which, when buckled back, became what is now called a facing, as in hats and boots, in which a corresponding alteration has taken

place. The frocks being cut down straight to cover the thighs (as grooms' frocks still are), were inconvenient to walk in; the opposite corners of each skirt were therefore furnished with a hook and eye, by which the skirt was fastened back, and hence the form of the flaps of military coats, of a different color from the coats, with an ornament in the place of a hook and eye. When I was a child (1790), I had a kind of military uniform which was made in this fashion, and I have seen uniforms of the Irish Volunteers in this style. This is the reason why a standing collar is essential to a full-dress coat; and that the Windsor uniform, rich, handsome, and laced as it was, and worn with a sword, cocked hat, and buckles, was not full dress, because it was a frock; because the cape and collars were red, while the coat was blue; and because the cape was a double one. Of this Windsor uniform there were three classes in the last thirty years of George III.: the common blue frock with red cape and cuffs, worn in the morning; the laced blue frock, with gold-laced button-holes on the breasts, pocket-flaps, capes, and cuffs; with this coat, white breeches, and a cocked hat and sword, were worn. It was the dress of those who attended the king when not actually at court. The third was a blue full-dress coat with standing collar, embroidered, with red silk breeches; this was a complete court dress, but worn only by cabinet ministers and the great officers of the crown. The Princes of the Blood, and the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, have a kind of frock uniform; blue for the former, &c.; the latter the color he may choose, lined with silk, and with a button bearing the initial and coronet of the Prince or Lord Lieutenant; but not otherwise differing from the usual frock coat. The uniform of George IV., when Prince of Wales, was blue lined with buff, and buff waistcoat and breeches. When he became Prince Regent, the buttons bore G. P. R., and also the members of his government wore it. There was also established a kind of full dress of blue, with black cape and cuffs,

and gold frogs, and Brandenberg embroidery; but it did not take.

The origin of these uniforms was a coat which the court of Louis XIV. wore in that monarch's visits to Marley, which was a kind of retirement, and to which it was therefore a great honor to be invited. The habit de Marly was therefore, at one time a great distinction. But every thing changes: when the Marquis of Vardes, a former favorite, returned to court, after a long exile, he thought it clever to appear in the old habit de Marly, with which he had been formerly honored, but it was so old-fashioned that he was laughed at; on which he said to the king, “Sire, loin de V. M. on n'est pas seulement malheureux, on devient encore ridicule." A few of us who had the Windsor uniform under the old king, continue still to wear it on some half-dress occasions, such as the Speaker's dinners, Lord Mayor's Day, &c.; but, much as it was once admired, it begins to grow strange. William IV. has established some official uniforms with graduated degrees of splendor: red velvet facings for his household, black velvet for diplomatists, and white for the Admiralty; with deep embroideries and white-feather hat trimmings for the greater officers, and lighter embroideries and black hat trimmings for the subordinates. This kind of livery (if I may use the expression), though in some respects convenient, and though it gives variety to a court which much wanted it, is not quite in accordance with our customs and manners; nor is, I think, the arrangement consistent with the principles on which our court dresses have been regulated; for a century and a half it has been too servilely borrowed from the foreign courts, where, as every thing is military, these civil dresses partook of the nature of a military uniform; hence the capes and cuffs of a different material and color from the coat itself. It is observable that the second Windsor uniform was copied by the Emperor of Russia for his civil service. We have since returned. the compliment.

Old Costume.—Dress is mutable, who denies it? but still old fashions are retained to a far greater extent than one would at first imagine. The Thames watermen rejoice in the dress of Elizabeth; while the royal beefeaters (buffetiers) wear that of private soldiers of the time of Henry VII.; the blue-coat boy, the costume of a London citizen of the reign of Edward VI.; the London charity-school girls, the plain mob cap and long gloves of the time of Queen Anne. In the brass badge of the cabmen, we see a retention of the dress of Elizabethan retainers; while the shoulder-knots that once decked an officer now adorn a footman. The attire of the sailor of William III.'s era is now seen amongst our fishermen. The university dress is as old as the age of the Smithfield martyrs. The linen bands of the pulpit and the bar are abridgments of the falling collar.

Other costumes are found lurking in provinces, and amongst some trades. The butchers' blue is the uniform of a guild. The quaint little head-dress of the market women of Kingswood, Gloucestershire, is in fact the gipsy hat of George II. Scarlet has been the color of soldiers' uniforms from the time of the Lacedemonians. The blue of the army we derived from the Puritans; of the navy from the colors of a mistress of George I.

Dishes.-Part of the payment of the king's servants used to consist of a certain number of dishes of meat. The lord president of the council was formerly allowed ten dishes of meat per diem; these ten dishes were eventually compounded for at £1000 per annum, while his salary was only £500. The lord steward had, I think, sixteen dishes. At the installations of knights of the garter, the knights were liberally provided. "On St. George's Day, 1667, each knight," says Evelyn, "had forty dishes to his mess, piled up five or six high." N. B.-This festival seems to have been kept in the banqueting-house.

Pantaloons, a kind of tight trowsers fitting the knee and leg, came into fashion about 1790, and were so called: the name,