obians and
sluts, if once they be in love they will be most neat and spruce; for,
[5505]_Omnibus rebus, et nitidis nitoribus antevenit amor_, they will
follow the fashion, begin to trick up, and to have a good opinion of
themselves, _venustatem enim mater Venus_; a ship is not so long a rigging
as a young gentlewoman a trimming up herself against her sweetheart comes.
A painter's shop, a flowery meadow, no so gracious aspect in nature's
storehouse as a young maid, _nubilis puella_, a Novitsa or Venetian bride,
that looks for a husband, or a young man that is her suitor; composed
looks, composed gait, clothes, gestures, actions, all composed; all the
graces, elegances in the world are in her face. Their best robes, ribands,
chains, jewels, lawns, linens, laces, spangles, must come on,
[5506]_praeter quam res patitur student elegantiae_, they are beyond all
measure coy, nice, and too curious on a sudden; 'tis all their study, all
their business, how to wear their clothes neat, to be polite and terse, and
to set out themselves. No sooner doth a young man see his sweetheart
coming, but he smugs up himself, pulls up his cloak now fallen about his
shoulders, ties his garters, points, sets his band, cuffs, slicks his hair,
twires his beard, &c. When Mercury was to come before his mistress,

[5507] ------"Chlamydemque ut pendeat apte
Collocat, ut limbus totumque appareat aurum."

"He put his cloak in order, that the lace.
And hem, and gold-work, all might have his grace."

Salmacis would not be seen of Hermaphroditus, till she had spruced up
herself first,

[5508] "Nec tamen ante adiit, etsi properabat adire,
Quam se composuit, quam circumspexit amictus,
Et finxit vultum, et meruit formosa videri."

"Nor did she come, although 'twas her desire,
Till she compos'd herself, and trimm'd her tire,
And set her looks to make him to admire."

Venus had so ordered the matter, that when her son [5509]Aeneas was to
appear before Queen Dido, he was

"Os humerosque deo similis (namque ipsa decoram
Caesariem nato genetrix, lumenque juventae
Purpureum et laetos oculis afflarat honores.")

like a god, for she was the tire-woman herself, to set him out with all
natural and artificial impostures. As mother Mammea did her son
Heliogabalus, new chosen emperor, when he was to be seen of the people
first. When the hirsute cyclopical Polyphemus courted Gal