powdering-room. Here were fixed two curtains, and the person went
behind, exposing the head only, which received its proper supply of
powder without any going on the clothes of the individual dressed. In
the _Rambler_, No. 109, under date 1751, a young gentleman writes that
his mother would rather follow him to his grave than see him sneak about
with dirty shoes and blotted fingers, hair unpowdered, and a hat
uncocked.

We have seen that hair-powder was taxed, and on the 5th of May, 1795, an
Act of Parliament was passed taxing persons using it. Pitt was in power,
and being sorely in need of money, hit upon the plan of a tax of a
guinea per head on those who used hair powder. He was prepared to meet
much ridicule by this movement, but he saw that it would yield a
considerable revenue, estimating it at as much as L200,000 a year. Fox,
with force, said that a fiscal arrangement dependent on a capricious
fashion must be regarded as an absurdity, but the Opposition were
unable to defeat the proposal, and the Act was passed. Pitt's powerful
rival, Charles James Fox, in his early manhood, was one of the most
fashionable men in London. Here are a few particulars of his "get up"
about 1770, drawn from the _Monthly Magazine_: "He had his chapeau-bas,
his red-heeled shoes, and his blue hair-powder." Later, when Pitt's tax
was gathered, like other Whigs, he refused to use hair-powder. For more
than a quarter of a century it had been customary for men to wear their
hair long, tied in a pig-tail and powdered. Pitt's measure gave rise to
a number of Crop Clubs. The _Times_ for April 14th, 1795, contains
particulars of one. "A numerous club," says the paragraph, "has been
formed in Lambeth, called the Crop Club, every member of which, on his
entrance, is obliged to have his head docked as close as the Duke of
Bridgewater's old bay coach-horses. This assemblage is instituted for
the purpose of opposing, or rather evading, the tax on powdered heads."
Hair cropping was by no means confined to the humbler ranks of society.
The _Times_ of April 25th, 1795, reports that: "The following noblemen
and gentlemen were at the party with the Duke of Bedford, at Woburn
Abbey, when a general cropping and combing out of hair-powder took
place: Lord W. Russell, Lord Villiers, Lord Paget, etc., etc. They
entered into an engagement to forfeit a sum of money if any of them
wore their hair tied, or powdered, within a certain period. Many
noblemen and gentl