of dress, even at a ruthless cost, because they
felt that in doing so they cooperated with a great natural law,--the
law which makes the "wanton lapwing" get himself another crest. They
played into nature's hands.

The nations which sought to bully nature, like the Spartans and the
Spaniards, passed the severest sumptuary laws; and for proving the
power of fundamental forces over the unprofitable wisdom of
reformers, there is nothing like a sumptuary law. In 1563 Spanish
women of good repute were forbidden to wear jewels or
embroideries,--the result being that many preferred to be thought
reputationless, rather than abandon their finery. Some years later
it was ordained that only women of loose life should be permitted
to bare their shoulders; and all dressmakers who furnished the
interdicted gowns to others than courtesans were condemned to four
years' penal servitude. These were stern measures,--"root and
branch" was ever the Spaniard's cry; but he found it easier to stamp
out heresy than to eradicate from a woman's heart something which
is called vanity, but which is, in truth, an overmastering impulse
which she is too wise to endeavour to resist.

As a matter of fact it was a sumptuary law which incited the women
of Rome to make their first great public demonstration, and to
besiege the Forum as belligerently as the women of England have, in
late years, besieged Parliament. The Senate had thought fit to save
money for the second Punic War by curtailing all extravagance in
dress; and, when the war was over, showed no disposition to repeal
a statute which--to the simple masculine mind--seemed productive of
nothing but good. Therefore the women gathered in the streets of Rome,
demanding the restitution of their ornaments, and deeply
scandalizing poor Cato, who could hardly wedge his way through the
crowd. His views on this occasion were expressed with the bewildered
bitterness of a modern British conservative. He sighed for the good
old days when women were under the strict control of their fathers
and husbands, and he very plainly told the Senators that if they had
maintained their proper authority at home, their wives and daughters
would not then be misbehaving themselves in public. "It was not
without painful emotions of shame," said this outraged Roman
gentleman, "that I just now made my way to the Forum through a herd
of women. Our ancestors thought it improper that women should
transact any private business w