WE are surprised that people do not follow our example in other things, and adapt their appearance and costume of body, at least, to the different seasons of the year, if they cannot, like us, change the shape and fashion of their thoughts. We beheld a man, the other day, fluttering along Prince's Street, with light jane trowsers, and a white straw hat. Has the animal no perception of changes in the atmosphere; or, as we rather suspect, has he only one pair of nether habiliments in the world? However it may be, he ought to be kept in solitary confinement; for the man who would outrage public decorum in this way, would have little scruple in murdering his nearest relation. We are offended every time we walk the streets, with a thousand instances of similar insanity. A person, in the heats of June or July, comes sweltering up to us buckled in a prodigious great-coat, which he probably terms a surtout; and carries his head tight on his shoulders by the aid of two or three neckcloths, which would smother an ordinary mortal in December. Another fellow hobbles past us in a pair of immense Wellington boots, or, at least, with his ankles thickly enveloped in prodigious gaiters-an article of wearing apparel which is at once the most snobbish and disagreeable. We ourselves are of a peculiarly delicate constitution, and, above all, are liable to sore throats from the easterly winds. But what is the use of all the precautions we can use, if fellows will wriggle past us dressed so thinly that their own miserable bloodless bodies chill the air more completely than Eurus himself could do, with Leslie's freezing machine in his hand, and an iceberg in each pocket? We are convinced that our last cough, from which, indeed, we are scarcely yet recovered, was inflicted on us by a man in nankeen trowsers, who stood beside us several minutes as we waited for a friend by the Glasgow mail. These things ought to be looked to a little more closely; and if people would only have the sense to dress by a thermometer, it would shew more wisdom than we are at present dis

VOL. XXVII, NO, CLXI.

posed to allow them. There might, by a very slight change of the present style, be a graduated scale of dress. In summer, instead of having the thermometer at 80 in the shade, the mercury might be made to rise to the words silk stockings and nankeens-as it gradually descended, it might point to cotton stockings, boots, cloth trowsers, drawers, and jackets, till at last it sunk fairly down to greatcoats, worsted gloves, and Belcher fogles. As to the colour of the habiliments, that, of course, ought to be left to the taste of the individual; but all men should not wrap themselves in windings of exactly the same tints and shades. No sooner does some colour come down strongly recommended from some London candidate for the Fleet, than universal Edinburgh appears in the same hue. Say the colour fixed upon is greenforth stalks a writer's clerk, fresh from the Orkneys, with a back as broad as his desk, and whiskers as red as his. sealing-wax, and struts about in a few days in the livery of Oberon and the Fairies. People with faces more lugubrious than if their aunts had recovered from a fever, make up, by the gaiety of their dress, for the funereal expression of their features. White hats are cocked up with a ludicrous jauntiness over grizzled locks on which a nightcap would be more becoming; and, in short, without reference to age, size, character, or profession, every man struts forth as nearly in the fashion as he can. But "what have we with men to do?" Let us advert to the ladies-Not unto thee, O thin-lipped and narrowshouldered virgin, blooming on, like the other evergreens, in thy fiftysecond winter, with a nose thin and blue as a darning needle, and a countenance with the amiable expression of a bowl of skim milk, are these observations directed; useless were any care upon thy toilet, unnoticed the elegance of thy head-dress, unremarked the beauty of thy gown. For thee the plainest and least distinguished garments are the most appropriate, and those,

"Like thine own planet in the west, When half conceal'd, are loveliest." So, beware of low necks, short

N

sleeves, or petticoats one inch above thy shoe. But to you, ye maids and matrons, from sixteen up to sixty, would an old man offer gentle and friendly advice; and, we beseech you, lay it seriously to your hearts, whether they beat in the gaiety and gladness of youth and beauty, behind the folds of a snowy muslin kerchief, or rest quiet and contented in married and matronly sedateness, beneath the warm Chinchilla tippit, and comfortable and close-pinned India shawl.

In the first place, let no one look, unless with loathing and contempt, at the fashions for the month. Let every one be her own pattern, and dress according to her figure, size, and complexion, and not according to the caprice or whim of another. If a great Leviathan, who happens to set the mode, chooses to envelope her acres of back and bosom in drapery so wide as to make it impossible to discover where the apparel ends, and where the natural contour begins; why, oh why, our own dear Jane, should you hide the fall of your shoulders, or the symmetry of your waist, in the same overwhelming and fantastic habiliments? Why change the rounded elegance of your own white and beautiful arm for the puffed-out, pudding-shaped sleeves which the sapient in millinery call gigot de mouton? Consult your mirror only for one single moment, and ask yourself, if a stiff frumpt-up Queen-Mary frill suit with the laughing playfulness of your eyes, or the gay and thoughtless expression of your mouth. By no means. Leave that and all other stiff articles of apparel to the large hazel-eyed imperial sort of beauties; but let one simple string of pearls hang on your blue-veined neck, and a thin gauze handkerchief rest carelessly on your shoulders. Hast thou dark waving ringlets? Oh maid, whose eyes now cast a halo of their own light over our pages, let red roses and pale honeysuckle nestle amid their tresses! Do thy blue eyes shine, like stars of joy, beneath the fleecy clouds of thy lightfalling hair? Twine a green wreath to encircle thy brow, of the leaves of the lemon-plant, holly, or even the cypress-tree. But why should a gentle young maiden wear any ornaments in her hair at all? Far better, and far

lovelier, are her simple tresses. The days of diamond combs, and pearl circlets, have luckily gone by, and pure is the delight to behold a face, radiant with smiles and beauty, half hid, in its playfulness and mirth, beneath a veil of falling curls, loose, wandering, and unconfined. There are some figures which dress cannot spoil, but there are none which dress may not improve. We have before us now at the table on which we write, a girl, beautiful, indeed, in herself, but so plainly, and yet so tastefully dressed, as to add to her natural loveliness. She has light brown hair, clustering thickly down her cheek; her blue eyes are fixed intently on a book, while her rosy lips seem to move unconsciously, and her brow to assume an appearance of intense excitement under the inspiration of what she is reading. She wears a plain white gown; a pink-coloured kerchief in vain endeavours to conceal the heavings of her breast; no necklace is round her throat-and, above all, none of those revolting remnants of barbarity-ear-rings-destroying the chaste simplicity of her cheek and neck. And what is there in all that? A thousand girls dress simply and elegantly in white gowns, a thousand wear no ornaments in their hair, and thousands upon thousands submit to no manacles in their ears; and yet, with many, this unadorned style would not be the most becoming. Give bracelets on the wrist, and aigrettes in her locks, to the flashing-eyed flirt; dress her in gaycoloured silks, and let rings sparkle on every finger as she lifts it in playful and heartless gaiety to captivate some large-eyed, wide-mouthed spoon, who thinks she cares only for him; but to the meek and gentle daughters of our hearts, the noiseless spirits of our homes, give drapery pure and spotless as their thoughts, and white as the snowy bosoms which it covers.

And yet, since truth must be spoken, the style of dress in the present day is certainly more becoming than the monstrosities we remember some years ago. The short waists were our utter abomination. Men's buttons took post exactly on the tip of their shoulder-bones, while the swallow-tails dangled their immensity of length till they tapered off below the

knees like the tail of an ourang-outang. The ladies were equally ridiculous. The bend of their figures was entirely destroyed; and as to the waist of a very sylph of twenty years of age, it was in no respect, unless by its superior breadth, to be distinguished from any other part of her form. At that time the backs of all the ladies in his Majesty's dominions were so precisely the same in appearance, that few men could recognise even their wives and daughters, unless they were gifted by nature with lameness or a hump. All distinctions of age were lost in the universal destitution of shape. Matrons of forty-five were by no means to be detected; even the mature ages of sixty and sixty-three, as long as the faces were concealed, reaped all the admiration due to twenty and twenty-five. Life and admiration were a complete puzzle to the most attentive observers. Impossible was it for Edipus himself to discover whether the object of his praise, who so gracefully walked the whole length of Prince's Street before him, was old enough for his grandmother or young enough for his child. We remember an odd adventure happening to our self. We were at that time poor, and then, as at all other times, handsome, good-natured,and obliging, and, of course, very much admired. This admiration, however, we are bound in candour to allow, was much more warm among the maids than the matrons of our acquaintance, and between us and one of them, who, besides a beautiful face, had an estate in Ayrshire, and expectations from her uncle, we confess the admiration was mutual. The mother, who was as watchful as mothers of rich daughters always are, did not seem quite to approve of our approaches; of which we had a gentle hint one day, when she requested our absence from her house, and begged to have the pleasure of a discontinuance of our acquaintance. Water thrown on flame makes it only burn the stronger, and a little opposition is the soul of love. We corresponded-blessings on the black-eyed waiting-maid! and agreed one day to meet. We went, and walking before us, we saw a figure which set our blood dancing in our veins. We followed-" Who," we exclaimed, “can gaze on that dear green silk

us.

gown, nor guess what a lovely form is enshrouded below it? Who can see that nodding umbrella-looking bonnet, nor guess what sparkling eyes and snowy teeth and rosy cheeks it maliciously conceals beneath it ?" We saw her step into Montgomery's, she stood at the counter" Now, now, we shall hear her voice, and see her beloved countenance again." In an instant we were beside her, and, with beating heart and quivering lips, whispered in her ear" Have you come at last? have you escaped the old dragon, your mother?" Our tongue clove to our mouth, our eyes glared like Roman candles, our lips trembled, and the last thing we remember was the voice of the servantmaid crying," John, John, bring some water here, a gentleman's in a fit!" It was her mother! When we recovered, the vision had disappeared; but woful were the consequences to We had fallen half across the counter; and after with our dexter arm demolishing two dozen tumblers, six glasses of jelly, and a marriage cake, we had subsided with our left arm among seven-and-thirty cranberry tarts, and finally got half choked as we sunk with our head totally immersed in an enormously widemouthed jar of pickled cabbages. This, in more senses than one, was the demolition of our suit; and fervently have we hated short waists, and watchful mothers, since that memorable day. More particularly, as before our cheek was healed, which we cut among the tumblers, or our three teeth become firm, which we loosened upon the counter, our love was married to an English dragoon, who, we understand, is going to stand for a rotten borough on the strength of her Ayrshire estate. Hundreds of similar mistakes, we have no hesitation in believing, rose from the doubtful waists, the medium anceps, of maid, wife, and widow. Now, however, these things are somewhat better managed. Now that nature is left comparatively to herself, it is impossible for any one to walk towards you, creating won der and fear from the ghastliness and wrinkles of her face, and, as you turn round to wonder who has passed, to walk away from you, creating love and admiration from the beauty and gracefulness of her back. For

the sameness of the colours in general use, we are still, no doubt, much to blame. But greatly as we approve of an independent exertion of each individual's taste in the selection and combining of her hues and shades, horrible and truly abominable is the search after singularity which actuates some of the ladies whom we have lately seen. Low-bosomed gowns are happily not in vogue; but wherefore, because every thing is not revealed, should every thing be totally covered up and hidden? Have not we seen ladies with their necks entirely and closely buckled round in a thick stuff stomacher, and looking as starched and stiff as a half-pay Lieutenant, whose military surtout is always (except on Mondays, when his shirt is clean) buttoned tightly over his black leather stock, for the double purpose of shewing his chest, and saving the necessity of a waistcoat? Haven't we known some of them, because ornaments which were useless were voted ungenteel, get quit even of their watches, sell them for the benefit of Bible Societies, and enrol themselves members of clubs for the making of shirts and flannel drawers for the poor and destitute? Oh, save," as Mr Bowles says in his beautiful, and in many places his sublime poem, of Banwell Hill-"Oh, save us from the tract-mad Miss,

"Who trots to every Bible club, and prates

Of this awakening minister and that,
She sat under !"

A slavish adherence to custom is very bad, but an absolute running counter to it is equally so. A dress which is in accordance with the age, complexion, and situation of any one, can never be wondered at as out of the way, nor laughed at as not being in the fashion. If people go to condole with an acquaintance on the death of her husband, which happened the last week, it would perhaps not be quite correct to do so on their way to a ball, with spangles glistening over their gowns, and silver laurel-leaves shining on their foreheads. But perhaps as bad as this would it be, to go to an assembly dressed" in the sable suits of woe," to waltz with a widow's veil upon their heads, or jump through a reel

with weepers on their sleeves. Dresses ought to be adapted also to the occupation the wearer intends to pursue. How ridiculous a gentleman would appear if he dug in his garden with white kid gloves on his hands, and dancing shoes on his feet! How absurd a lady would seem, mending her husband's worsted stockings, dressed all the time in her ball-room finery! But enough of this. Fathers have odd fancies, and dress their family more in accordance with their own taste than their daughters' appearances. We called, when we were fast in Suffolk, on an old friend of ours, whom we had not seen for many years. He was a humorist in his way, and was blessed with the most complete credulity, mixed with the least quantity of shrewdness, of any matter-of-fact individual we ever knew. Old Simon's reception of us was kind, his invitation to stay with him was pressing, and we stayed. The room in which we saw him was remarkably well furnished; but the sun was shining bright-it was the middle of summer-and the whole apartment was one blaze of light. The curtains of the windows were of the most dazzling yellow-the carpet was yellow, with here and there a blue spot on it-the walls were yellowthe grate was yellow-the chairs and sofas all of the same hue-and all the pictures round the room were enshrined in bright yellow frames. Our old friend himself, from the reflection of the colour, was as yellow in the face as a jaundiced man, or a new brass button; and our eyes began to be affected by gazing on the same changeless, unmitigated tint. We asked him for a snuff, and a yellow box containing Lundifoot was immediately put into our hands. We drew from our pocket a handkerchief, which unfortunately was of the fated hue. "Beautiful handkerchief!" exclaimed our friend; "such a very lovely colour! Pray, sir, let me see. Aye, real Bandana; and such a bright glowing yellow!"

-"Yes," we replied, resolving to play a little on the simplicity of our friend;" it is a good handkerchief; and it is sometimes right to run a little risk, though a cloth of any other shade would do just as well, and not be at all dangerous."➡

"Dangerous! risk!" exclaimed our yellow friend, with a slight tinge of blue spreading over his features"What can you be talking of? Yellow is the very best colour of them all. My gig is yellow-my carriage is yellow-I keep no birds but canaries-and what do you talk about risks and dangers for ?"-" Then you haven't heard the discovery made by the German metaphysicians, that our thoughts take the colour of what is presented to the senses?-Yellow is a most dangerous colour-yellow thoughts make people misers, pickpockets, and murderers."-" God have mercy upon us all! if that's the case; for I'm sure my thoughts must be yellow, beyond the power of man to change them. My wife's thoughts must be yellow as this sofa. And Mary, poor dear yellow-thoughted Mary! what shall I do to dye them?" -"Give them a slight infusion," we said, as solemnly as possible, "of blue damask furniture; and let Mary be feasted on a green silk pelisse.'

"Ah now," said our friend, "I know you're only joking.-Curse metaphysics! I never could understand a word of them in my life. Feast on a green-silk pelisse! Ha, ha! I'll tell Mary what a supper you propose."-" No, sir-serious as a judge -even in the time we have been here, we feel as if ill of the yellow fever."-" Fever!" cried Simon, wofully alarmed; "is it infectious? How pale you look! Shall I ring the bell, sir? Mary, Mary, do leave the room; the yellow fever is raging here already; and all from these confounded yellow curtains! The gentleman has swallowed a sofacover!-How do you feel now, sir?" -"A few yards, properly applied, of a dark green crumb cloth, would be very advantageous. A black coalscuttle would also be a great relief." We looked at Mary as we said this, and saw a very pretty little girl of

seventeen or eighteen, dressed all in the everlasting colour-yellow from top to toe, her very hair being slightly golden, and her sandals of yellow silk. Her mother also came in, and was closely followed by a servant in yellow livery. All seemed fixed in the utmost astonishment. We ourself sat quietly on the sofa, after having bowed to the ladies; while Simon went on with a string of questions and exclamations, which were totally unintelligible to them; and ended at last with a denunciation of his favourite furniture, which seemed to give great satisfaction to his wife and daughter. "We were remarking to Mr Yellowly, when you came in, madam," we said to the lady, in our usual bland and insinuating manner," that we thought this room would be somewhat improved by the addition of some furniture of a different colour, and he seems now to agree with us in opinion."-" God bless me!" cried Simon, stopping short in his walk"I understood you to say you had been infected by the furniture with the yellow fever; that the fever had made you mad, and you wished to swallow a crumb-cloth, and sup on the coal-scuttle. Mary was to eat a green pelisse, and you, my dear, were to be treated with an infusion of a chest of drawers." We immediately explained; and the ladies, who seemed accustomed to Simon's absurdities, were easily satisfied of his mistake; more especially as he promised them dresses of the colours they themselves should prefer; and we saw the pretty Mary, before our departure, in a gown of the purest white, a deep blue ribbon round her waist, with white silk stockings and black shoes; which, to the young, the simple, and the unaffected, is the handsomest and most interesting dress they can poss sibly put on.