llowance] put in Aunt Rachel.

"Six shirts, my dear Aunt!--and six pair of stockings!" laughed Jack.
"Why, 'twere not one the day."

"Two a-week is enow for any man--without he be a chimney-sweep," said
Aunt Rachel oracularly.

This idea evidently amused Jack greatly.

"'Tis in very deed as I said but now: you have no fantasy hereaway of
the necessities of a man that is in the Court. He must needs have his
broidered shirts, his Italian ruff, well-set, broidered, and starched;
his long-breasted French doublet, well bombasted [padded]; his hose,--
either French, Gally, or Venetian; his corked Flemish shoes of white
leather; his paned [slashed and puffed with another colour or material]
velvet breeches, guarded with golden lace; his satin cloak, well
broidered and laced; his coats of fine cloth, some forty shillings the
yard; his long, furred gown of Lukes' [Lucca] velvet; his muff, Spanish
hat, Toledo rapier; his golden and jewelled ear-rings; his stays--"

A few ejaculations, such as "Good lack!" and "Well-a-day!" had been
audible from Aunt Rachel as the list proceeded; but Sir Thomas kept
silence until the mention of this last article, which was in his eyes a
purely feminine item of apparel.

"Nay, Jack, nay, now! Be the men turning women in the Court?"

"And the women turning men, belike," added Rachel. "The twain do
oft-times go together."

"My good Sir!" returned Jack, with amused condescension. "How shall a
gentleman go about a sorry figure, more than a gentlewoman?"

"Marry come up!" interposed Rachel. "If the gentleman thou hast scarce
finished busking be not a sorry figure, I ne'er did see the like."

"Stays, ear-rings, muffs!" repeated Sir Thomas under his breath.
"Belike a fan, too, Jack?--and a pomander?--and masks?--and gloves?"

"Gloves, without doubt, sir; and they of fair white Spanish leather,
wrought with silk. Masks, but rarely; nor neither fans nor pomanders."

"Not yet, I reckon. Dear heart! what will the idle young gallants be
a-running after the next? We shall have them twisting rats' tails in
their hair, or riding in coaches."

"I ensure you, Sir, many gentlemen do even now ride in coaches. 'Tis
said the Queen somewhat misliketh the same."

"Dear heart!" said Sir Thomas again.

"And now, Sir, you can well see all these must needs be had--"

"Beshrew me, Jack, if I see aught of the sort!"

"All I see," retorted Rachel, "is, if they be had, they must be paid
for."

"Nay