ashionable colors, among which are mentioned a queer greenish-yellow, a
pease-porridge-tawny, a popinjay of blue, a lusty gallant, and the "devil
in the hedge." These may be favorites still, for aught I know.

Mr. Furnivall quotes a description of a costume of the period, from the
manuscript of Orazio Busino's "Anglipotrida." Busino was the chaplain of
Piero Contarina, the Venetian ambassador to James I, in 1617. The
chaplain was one day stunned with grief over the death of the butler of
the embassy; and as the Italians sleep away grief, the French sing, the
Germans drink, and the English go to plays to be rid of it, the
Venetians, by advice, sought consolation at the Fortune Theatre; and
there a trick was played upon old Busino, by placing him among a bevy of
young women, while the concealed ambassador and the secretary enjoyed the
joke. "These theatres," says Busino, "are frequented by a number of
respectable and handsome ladies, who come freely and seat themselves
among the men without the slightest hesitation . . . . Scarcely was I
seated ere a very elegant dame, but in a mask, came and placed herself
beside me . . . . She asked me for my address both in French and English;
and, on my turning a deaf ear, she determined to honor me by showing me
some fine diamonds on her fingers, repeatedly taking off no fewer than
three gloves, which were worn one over the other . . . . This lady's
bodice was of yellow satin, richly embroidered, her petticoat--[It is a
trifle in human progress, perhaps scarcely worth noting, that the "round
gown," that is, an entire skirt, not open in front and parting to show
the under petticoat, did not come into fashion till near the close of the
eighteenth century.]--of gold tissue with stripes, her robe of red velvet
with a raised pile, lined with yellow muslin with broad stripes of pure
gold. She wore an apron of point lace of various patterns; her headtire
was highly perfumed, and the collar of white satin beneath the delicately
wrought ruff struck me as exceedingly pretty." It was quite in keeping
with the manners of the day for a lady of rank to have lent herself to
this hoax of the chaplain.

Van Meteren, a Netherlander, 1575, speaks also of the astonishing change
or changeableness in English fashions, but says the women are well
dressed and modest, and they go about the streets without any covering of
mantle, hood, or veil; only the married women wear a hat in the street
and in the house;