s, I
do not desire to dictate in the matter. On the contrary I shall be
perfectly satisfied with whatever may be judged decent and proper. I
should even scarcely have ventured to suggest, that perhaps a servile
adherence to the garb of antiquity might not be altogether so expedient,
as some little deviation in favor of the modern costume."

Washington, as noted, bought his clothes in England; but it was
from necessity more than choice. "If there be any homespun Cloths in
Philadelphia which are tolerably fine, that you can come reasonably at,"
he said to his Philadelphia agent in 1784, "I would be obliged to you to
send me patterns of some of the best kinds--I should prefer that which is
mixed in the grain, because it will not so readily discover its quality as
a plain cloth." Before he was inaugurated he wrote "General Knox this day
to procure me homespun broadcloth of the Hartford fabric, to make a suit
of clothes for myself," adding, "I hope it will not be a great while
before it will be unfashionable for a gentleman to appear in any
other dress. Indeed, we have already been too long subject to British
prejudices." At another time he noted in his diary with evident pride, "on
this occasion I was dressed in a suit made at the Woolen Manufactory at
Hartford, as the buttons also were." But then, as now, the foreign clothes
were so much finer that his taste overcame his patriotism, and his
secretary wrote that "the President is desireous of getting as much
superfine blk broad Cloth as will make him a suit of Clothes, and desires
me to request that you would send him that quantity ... The best superfine
French or Dutch black--exceedingly fine--of a soft, silky texture--not
glossy like the Engh cloths."

A caller during the Presidency spoke of him as dressed in purple satin,
and at his levees he is described by Sullivan as "clad in black velvet;
his hair in full dress, powdered and gathered behind in a large silk bag;
yellow gloves on his hands; holding a cocked hat with a cockade in it, and
the edges adorned with a black feather about an inch deep. He wore knee
and shoe buckles; and a long sword, with a finely wrought and polished
steel hilt, which appeared at the left hip; the coat worn over the sword,
so that the hilt, and the part below the coat behind, were in view. The
scabbard was white polished leather."

About his person Washington was as neat as he desired his clothes to be.
At seventeen when surveying he reco