nd how little furniture hath the other! How long time is asked in
decking up of the first, and how little space left wherein to feed the
latter! How curious, how nice also, are a number of men and women, and how
hardly can the tailor please them in making it fit for their bodies! How
many times must it be sent back again to him that made it! What chafing,
what fretting, what reproachful language, doth the poor workman bear
away![154] And many times when he doth nothing to it at all, yet when it
is brought home again it is very fit and handsome; then must we put it on,
then must the long seams of our hose be set by a plumb-line, then we puff,
then we blow, and finally sweat till we drop, that our clothes may stand
well upon us. I will say nothing of our heads, which sometimes are polled,
sometimes curled, or suffered to grow at length like woman's locks, many
times cut off, above or under the ears, round as by a wooden dish. Neither
will I meddle with our variety of beards, of which some are shaven from
the chin like those of Turks, not a few cut short like to the beard of
Marquess Otto, some made round like a rubbing brush, others with a _pique
de vant_ (O! fine fashion!), or now and then suffered to grow long, the
barbers being grown to be so cunning in this behalf as the tailors. And
therefore if a man have a lean and straight face, a Marquess Otton's cut
will make it broad and large; if it be platter-like, a long, slender beard
will make it seem the narrower; if he be weasel-becked, then much hair
left on the cheeks will make the owner look big like a bowdled hen, and as
grim as a goose, if Cornelis of Chelmersford say true. Many old men do
wear no beards at all. Some lusty courtiers also and gentlemen of courage
do wear either rings of gold, stones, or pearl, in their ears, whereby
they imagine the workmanship of God not to be a little amended. But herein
they rather disgrace than adorn their persons, as by their niceness in
apparel, for which I say most nations do not unjustly deride us, as also
for that we do seem to imitate all nations round about us, wherein we be
like to the polypus or chameleon; and thereunto bestow most cost upon our
arses, and much more than upon all the rest of our bodies, as women do
likewise upon their heads and shoulders. In women also, it is most to be
lamented, that they do now far exceed the lightness of our men (who
nevertheless are transformed from the cap even to the very shoe), and su