vertiser_ in 1749, "Black Shammy
Gloves and White Glazed Lambs Wool Gloves suitable for Funerals." White
gloves were as often given as black, and purple gloves also. Good
specimens of old mourning gloves have been preserved in the cabinets of
the Worcester Society of Antiquity.

At the funeral of Thomas Thornhill "17 pair of White Gloves at L1 15_s._
6_d._, 31-1/2 yard Corle for Scarfs L3 10_s._ 10-1/2_d._, and Black and
White Ribbin" were paid for. In 1737 Sir William Pepperell sent to
England for "4 pieces Hat mourning and 2 pieces of Cyprus or Hood
mourning." This hat mourning took the form of long weepers, which were
worn on the hat at the funeral, and as a token of respect afterward by
persons who were not relatives of the deceased. Judge Sewall was always
punctilious in thus honoring the dead in his community. On May 2, 1709,
he writes thus:

"Being artillery day and Mr. Higginson dead I put on my mourning
Rapier and put a mourning ribbon in my little Cane."

Rings were given at funerals, especially in wealthy families, to near
relatives and persons of note in the community. Sewall records in his
diary, in the years from 1687 to 1725, the receiving of no less than
fifty-seven mourning rings. We can well believe the story told of Doctor
Samuel Buxton, of Salem, who died in 1758, aged eighty-one years, that
he left to his heirs a quart tankard full of mourning rings which he had
received at funerals; and that Rev. Andrew Eliot had a mugful. At one
Boston funeral, in 1738, over two hundred rings were given away. At
Waitstill Winthrop's funeral sixty rings, worth over a pound apiece,
were given to friends. The entire expense of the latter-named
funeral--scutcheons, hatchments, scarves, gloves, rings, bell-tolling,
tailor's bills, etc., was over six hundred pounds. This amounted to
one-fifth of the entire estate of the deceased gentleman.

These mourning rings were of gold, usually enamelled in black, or black
and white. They were frequently decorated with a death's-head, or with a
coffin with a full-length skeleton lying in it, or with a winged skull.
Sometimes they held a framed lock of hair of the deceased friend.
Sometimes the ring was shaped like a serpent with his tail in his
mouth. Many bore a posy. In the _Boston News Letter_ of October 30,
1742, was advertised: "Mourning Ring lost with the Posy Virtue & Love is
From Above." Here is another advertisement from the _Boston Evening
Post_:

"Esc