DRESSED TO KILL.

Auckland Star, 2 September 1933, Page 10 (Supplement)

DRESSED TO KILL.

Nowadays, when dress economy is preached, it is at tho woman that tho sermon is pointed. It waa not ever so. Here is a contemporary description of a man dressed iu tho height of fashion in the days when Dr. Johnson was wont to shamblo along Fleet Street, London, in woollen stockings, a coarso brown suit, and his wig awry: "A mixed silk coat, pink satin waistcoat, breeches covered with silver net, white stockings with pink clocks, pink satin shoes with largo pearl buckles; a mushroom-coloured stock Covered with fine point-lace, hair dressed high and stuck full of pearl pins." When this fashionable gentleman -went for a walk he donned a cocked hat too small by half, perched rakishly on his pigtailcd wig, carried a long tasselled walking-stick in one hand and a bouquet in tho other, and stopped frequently to seo if his "hat was straight" by the aid of a gold-framed pocket mirror. Even ho was beaten by tho riot of rainbow colours which adorned his grandfather in tho great days of Marlborough. In his wardrobe were embroidered coats of every hue, from Sam- \ ing scarlet to sky blue and grass green, richly-laced waistcoats with goldworked buttonholes, and breeches of black velvet of the. finest silk. His dressing-tablo would put to shame the dressing-room of an actress or a society beauty of to-day. Lip salves, powderpuffs, almond paste, perfumes, lotions, salves for removing moles or specks, and combs of all sizes, including ouo for combing tbo brows and eyelashes. He received his friends sitting in bed in a gold-embroidered dressing-gown of many hues. His greatest pleasure was to sit among tho ladies sewing. Even when ho "went to 1)0 a soldier" his regimentals wcro splendid. Ho was a band-box soldier. Yet ho helped to win Kamillics, Malplaquet, aiid Blenheim.