ere a dog in a doublet, you shall not see
any so disguised as are my countrymen of England. And as these
fashions are diverse, so likewise it is a world to see the costliness
and the curiosity, the excess and the vanity, the pomp and the
bravery, the change and the variety, and finally the fickleness and
the folly, that is in all degrees, insomuch that nothing is more
constant in England than inconstancy of attire. Oh, how much cost is
bestowed nowadays upon our bodies, and how little upon our souls! How
many suits of apparel hath the one, and how little furniture hath the
other! How long time is asked in decking up of the first, and how
little space left wherein to feed the latter! How curious, how nice
also, are a number of men and women, and how hardly can the tailor
please them in making it fit for their bodies! How many times must it
be sent back again to him that made it! What chafing, what fretting,
what reproachful language, doth the poor workman bear away! And many
times when he doth nothing to it at all, yet when it is brought home
again it is very fit and handsome; then must we put it on, then must
the long seams of our hose be set by a plumb-line, then we puff, then
we blow, and finally sweat till we drop, that our clothes may stand
well upon us. I will say nothing of our heads, which sometimes are
polled, sometimes curled, or suffered to grow at length like woman's
locks, many times cut off, above or under the ears, round as by a
wooden dish. Neither will I meddle with our variety of beards, of
which some are shaven from the chin like those of Turks, not a few
cut short like to the beard of Marquess Otto, some made round like a
rubbing brush, others with a _pique de vant_ (O! fine fashion!), or
now and then suffered to grow long, the barbers being grown to be so
cunning in this behalf as the tailors. And therefore if a man have a
lean and straight face, a Marquess Otton's cut will make it broad and
large; if it be platter-like, a long, slender beard will make it seem
the narrower; if he be weasel-becked, then much hair left on the
cheeks will make the owner look big like a bowdled hen, and as grim
as a goose, if Cornells of Chelmersford say true. Many old men do
wear no beards at all. Some lusty courtiers also and gentlemen of
courage do wear either rings of gold, stones, or pearl, in their ears,
whereby they imagine the workmanship of God not to be a little
amended. But herein they rather disgrace than ador