his hat, which, now, I cannot
positively say, though I saw him, was so."

Even so late as Queen Anne's reign, which witnessed the introduction of
three-cornered hats, a Lord Keeper wore his own hair in court instead
of a wig, until he received the sovereign's order to adopt the venerable
disguise of a full-bottomed wig. Lady Sarah Cowper recorded of her
father, 1705:--"The queen after this was persuaded to trust a Whigg
ministry, and in the year 1705, Octr., she made my father Ld. Keeper of
the Great Seal, in the 41st year of his age--'tis said the youngest Lord
Keeper that ever had been. He looked very young, and wearing his own
hair made him appear yet more so, which the queen observing, obliged him
to cut it off, telling him the world would say she had given the seals
to a boy."

The young Lord Keeper of course obeyed; and when he appeared for the
first time at court in a wig, his aspect was so grave and reverend that
the queen had to look at him twice before she recognized him. More than
half a century later, George II. experienced a similar difficulty, when
Lord Hardwicke, after the close of his long period of official service,
showed himself at court in a plain suit of black velvet, with a bag and
sword. Familiar with the appearance of the Chancellor dressed in
full-bottomed wig and robes, the king failed to detect his old friend
and servant in the elderly gentleman who, in the garb of a private
person of quality, advanced and rendered due obeisance. "Sir, it is Lord
Hardwicke," whispered a lord in waiting who stood near His Majesty's
person, and saw the cause of the cold reception given to the
ex-Chancellor. But unfortunately the king was not more familiar with the
ex-Chancellor's title than his appearance, and in a disastrous endeavor
to be affable inquired, with an affectation of interest, "How long has
your lordship been in town?" The peer's surprise and chagrin were great
until the monarch, having received further instruction from the courtly
prompter at his elbow, frankly apologized in bad English and with noisy
laughter. "Had Lord Hardwicke," says Campbell, "worn such a uniform as
that invented by George IV. for ex-Chancellors (very much like a Field
Marshal's), he could not have been mistaken for a common man."

The judges who at the first introduction of wigs refused to adopt them
were prone to express their dissatisfaction with those coxcombical
contrivances when exhibited upon the heads of counsel; an