made a brave show in those days. A group of men might
be as strong in color and as vivid in contrast as a group of women; the
neutralization of tone, the degradation of hue, did not begin till much
later, and only conquered in the cataclysm of the birth-throes of two
republics. Blue and scarlet, green and yellow, crimson and purple,
orange and plum-color were the daily wear of the well-to-do; and even
for the less wealthy there were the warm browns and murreys, the
bottle-greens and clarets, and lavenders and buffs which made any crowd
a thing to please a painter in the eighteenth century. In all the {18}
varying breeds of beaux and macaronis and dandies, of bucks and
fribbles, into which the fine gentlemen of the age allowed themselves
to be classified, the one dominant feature, the one common
characteristic, was the love for gold and silver and fine laces, for
gaudiness of color and richness of ornament, for every kind of
exquisite extravagance, every refinement in foppishness. There was a
passion for the punctilio of dress, for the grace of a gold-headed cane
and a chased sword-hilt, for the right ribbon, the right jewel, the
right flower, and the right perfume, for the right powder in the hair
and the right seals on the fob and the right heels and buckles on the
shoes. There was an ardent appreciation, an uncompromising worship of
the fine feathers that make fine birds.

[Sidenote: 1761--The wine-drinking propensities of the age]

The social system of the polite world had been slowly changing with the
successive Georges. The familiar events in the lives of the well-to-do
classes were growing steadily later. The dinner hour, which was
generally at noon or one in the reign of Queen Anne, had crept on to
three o'clock under the first, and to four o'clock under the second
George. Under the third it was to grow later and later, until it made
Horace Walpole rage as if the world were coming to an end because among
fashionable folk it had settled itself at six o'clock. In the country,
indeed, for the most part people lived the quiet lives and kept the
early hours of Sir Roger de Coverley. But, however, London lived, and
whatever London chose to do, England's simple honest King and England's
simple honest Queen would have no concern with the follies of fashion
and the luxuries of late hours. However much the rashness and
wrong-headedness of his public policy forced him to accept the services
and prime the pocket