little mortifying, it is atoned for by a triumphant attitude which
disarms hypercriticism. Also the lady's posture makes it difficult for
us to tell whether it is a stick or an umbrella she is carrying.

[Illustration: 1908]

There is a pictorial hiatus of some years, but the text notes that
crinoline for women enjoyed a sway of some years' duration. For, taking
the tracings from the plates in the order in which they are given in the
book, we find a subdued form of the article in the female costume for
1905. The ladies may well regard this plate as astounding. There is even
a suggestion of "bloomer" about its nether portion, and if the hat is
not without precedent in history, the waist is little short of
revolutionary.

[Illustration: 1910]

The next plate displays a gentleman's habit for the year 1908. The
tailors, fifteen years hence, seemed to have borrowed, in the
construction of the coat, very liberally from the lady's mantle of 1893.
Apropos of this and the ensuing three plates, it is pleasing to be told,
as we are by the author of this book, that the long reign of black is
doomed. Towards the close of April, 1898, Lord Arthur Lawtrey appeared
in the Park attired literally in purple and fine linen, _i.e._, in a
violet coat, with pale heliotrope trousers.

[Illustration: 1902, 1911-12]

Yet, in spite of the opposition to Lord Arthur, the wave was due, and
the affection for colour spread. The new century, at its birth, saw
black relegated to the past--also to the future. This was midway in the
Ebullient Age. Pent up for decades, mankind naturally began to slop over
with sartorial enthusiasm. In 1920 its _bizarrerie_ became offensive,
and an opposition crusade was directed against it. Something had to be
conceded. Trousers, which had been wavering between nautical buttons and
gallooned knees--or, in the vernacular of the period, a sail three
sheets in the wind and a flag at half-mast--were the items sacrificed.
Knee-breeches enjoyed vogue for a time, but only for a time; for they
vanished suddenly in 1930 and were replaced by tights or shapes. Boots
made way for Elizabethan slippers. Hats had long since gone the way of
the superannuated. Taught by the Darwinian theory, society discovered
whence its tendency to baldness originated. They had recourse by degrees
to flexible tiles of extraordinary cut.

[Illustration: 1912]

[Illustration: 1912]

A further glance at the costume for the swells between 1902 an