xploitation of remote
districts as tourist and sporting centres. Brittany, however, has been
remarkably faithful to her sartorial traditions, and even to-day in
the remoter parts of the west and in distant sea-coast places her men
and women have not ceased to express outwardly the strong national and
personal individuality of their race. In these districts it is still
possible for the traveller to take a sudden, bewildering, and wholly
entrancing step back into the past.

In Cornouaille the national costume is more jealously cherished than
in any other part of the country, even to the smallest details, for
here the men carry a _pen-bas_, or cudgel, which is as much a
supplement to their attire and as characteristic of it as the Irish
shillelagh is of the traditional Irish dress. Quimper is perhaps
second to Cornouaille in fidelity to the old costume, for all the men
wear the national habit. On gala days this consists of gaily
embroidered and coloured waistcoats, which often bear the travelling
tailor's name, and voluminous _bragou-bras_, or breeches of blue or
brown, held at the waist with a broad leather belt with a metal buckle
and caught in at the knee with ribbons of various hues, the whole set
off with black leather leggings and shoes ornamented with silver
buckles. A broad-brimmed hat, beneath which the hair falls down
sometimes to below the shoulders, finishes a toilet which on weekdays
or work-days has to give place to white _bragou-bras_ of tough
material, something more sombre in waistcoats, and the ever
serviceable sabot.

_Hats and Hymen_

In the vast stretch of the salt-pans of Escoublac, between Batz and Le
Croisic, where the entire population of the district is employed, the
workers, or _paludiers_, affect a smock-frock with pockets, linen
breeches, gaiters, and shoes all of white, and with this dazzling
costume they wear a huge, flapping black hat turned up on one side to
form a horn-shaped peak. This peak is very important, as it indicates
the state of the wearer, the young bachelor adjusting it with great
nicety over the ear, the widower above his forehead, and the married
man at the back of his head. On Sundays or gala-days, however, this
uniform is discarded in favour of a multicoloured and more distinctive
attire, the breeches being of fine cloth, exceedingly full and pleated
and finished with ribbons at the knees, the gaiters and white shoes of
everyday giving place to white woollen stockings