the wearers' bodies and "maketh them weak,
tender, and infirm, not able to abide such blustering storms and sharp
showers as many other people abroad do daily bear." It is curious to
find him harking back to the old days of which he had heard his father
and other sages speak, when all the clothes for the household were
made by the busy housewife, and coats were of the same color as
the wool when it was on the sheep's back. In the abandonment of the
household woollen industry and the excessive use of imported fabrics,
he sees the reason for the many thousands in England who were reduced
to the necessity of begging bread. Starch, which is now such a homely
and universally helpful laundry assistant, and to the expert use of
which so much of the freshness and smartness of women's attire is due,
was then first introduced. "There is a certain liquid matter which
they call starch," says this censorious critic of current customs,
"wherein the devil hath learned them to wash and dive their ruffs;
which, being dry, will then stand stiff and inflexible about their
necks." The ladies of his day must have been more expert in the use
of starch than are their sisters to-day, as they introduced into it
coloring matter, so that it temporarily dyed the fabrics red, blue,
purple, and other colors, of which yellow seems to have been the most
esteemed.

The yellow starch which was so much in use originated in France, and
was introduced into England by a Mrs. Turner, a physician's widow,
a vain and infamous woman, who ended her career on the gallows in
expiation of the murder of Sir Thomas Overbury. Bulwer says that it is
hard "to derive the pedigree of the cobweb-lawn-yellow-starched ruffs,
which so disfigured our nation, and rendered them so ridiculous and
fantastical." It appears that when the introducer of the custom was
led to the gallows she was conspicuous in a yellow ruff worn about
her neck, and after her execution the wearing of such ruffs rapidly
declined. Having said this much about the ruffs which were a
characteristic feature of the dress of the day of both men and women,
it may be well to add that starch was not wholly depended upon for the
support of these preposterous neck dresses. Wire frames covered with
silver or silk thread were employed for the purpose. These ruffs are
often referred to in the literature of the period. Allusion is made to
them in the play of _Nice Valour_, by Beaumont and Fletcher, where the
madman say