t, black satin
small-clothes, white silk stockings and red morocco slippers."

What gay peacock was this strutting all point-device in scarlet slippers
and satin and damask, spreading his gaudy feathers at high noon in sober
Boston streets!--was this our boasted Republican simplicity? And what
"fop-tackle" did the dignified Judge of the Supreme Court wear in Boston
at that date? He walked home from the bench in the winter time clad in a
magnificent white corduroy surtout lined with fur, with his judicial
hands thrust in a great fur muff.

Fancy a Boston publisher going about his business tricked up in this
dandified dress--a true New England jessamy.

He wore a pea-green coat, white vest, nankeen small-clothes, white
silk stockings and pumps fastened with silver buckles which covered
at least half the foot from instep to toe. His small-clothes were
tied at the knees with riband of the same color in double bows the
ends reaching down to the ancles. His hair in front was well loaded
with pomatum, frizzled or creped, and powdered; the ear locks had
undergone the same process. Behind his natural hair was augmented
by the addition of a large queue, called vulgarly the false tail,
which, enrolled in some yards of black riband, hung halfway down
his back.

We must believe that the richest brocades, the finest lawn, the choicest
laces, the heaviest gold and silver buckles, did not adorn the persons
of New England dames and belles only; the gaudiest inflorescence of
color and stuffs shone resplendent on the manly figures of their
husbands and brothers. And yet these men were no "lisping hawthorn
buds," their souls were not in their clothes, or we had not the signers
of the Declaration of Independence and the heroes of the Revolution.

The domination of French ideas in America after the Revolution found one
form of expression in French fashions of dress; and where New England
women had formerly followed English models and English reproductions of
French fashions, they now copied the French fashions direct, to the
improvement, I fancy, of their modes. Too many accounts and
representations exist of these comparatively recent styles to make it of
value to enter into any detail of them here. But another influence on
the dress of the times should be recorded.

The sudden and vast development of the Oriental trade by New England
ship-owners is plainly marked by many changes i