this, they made scandal by ruffling
with weapons--"bucklers brode and sweardes long, bandrike with
baselardes kene." The skill of goldsmiths and craftsmen decorates all
the appurtenances of the dress of this 14th century. Buttons, which
appear in the first Edward's time as a scandalous ornament on men of low
degree, have now become common, and, cunningly wrought, are used as much
for _queintise_ as for service. A close row of them will run from wrist
to elbow of tight sleeve. A row of buttons goes from the neck of a
woman's gown, and the _cote-hardie_ may be fastened down the front with
a dozen and a half of rich buttons. A purse or gipciere hung by a ring
to the girdle gives more room for ornament in the silver or brass bar on
which the bag depends. Above all the girdle, which--in harness or in
silk--rich men wear broad and bossed with jewels across the thigh below
the waist, makes work for the jeweller's craftsman. Such a girdle is for
great folk alone; but lesser men, wearing a strap about their waists,
will yet have a handsome buckle and a fanciful pendant of metal guarding
the loose end of the strap.

[Illustration: FIG. 32.--Henry, Prince of Wales, and Occleve the Poet
(c. 1410). (From Arundel MS. 38.)]

However fantastic the fashions of this or any other ages, folk of the
middling sort will avoid the extremes. From the Knight to the Reve, no
man of Chaucer's company calls to us by the fantasy of his clothing. The
Knight himself rides in his fustian _gipoun_, the grime of his habergeon
upon it, although his son's short gown, the gayest garment at the
Tabard, had long and wide sleeves and is embroidered with flowers like
any mead. A coat and hood of green mark the Yeoman, who has a silver
Christopher brooch for ornament. The Merchant is in motley stuff, his
beaver hat from Flanders and his clasped boots taking Chaucer's eye, as
do the _anlas_ and silken _gipser_ which hang at the rich Franklin's
belt. As for the London burgesses, their knife-chapes, girdles and
pouches are in clean silver. The Shipman wears his knife in a lanyard
about his neck, as his fellows do to this day, and his coat is of coarse
falding to the knee. The Wife of Bath has the wimple below her broad hat
and rides in a foot mantle about her hips. Poorer men's dress is on the
Reve and the Ploughman, the one in a long _surcote_ of sky-blue and the
other in the _tabard_ which we may recognize as that smock-frock which
goes down the ages with littl