father's house stood. Christ's Hospital was another old religious house, and was converted by Edward the Sixth into a school; and the yellow stockings and odd dress of the boys still show you the sort of dress worn by children at the time when the school was founded.

Richard. I am very glad to find I have seen how boys were dressed so long ago.

1 Mrs. M. You have also seen how the men were dressed. Don't you remember the beef-eaters you saw in London? They wear the same kind of dress that was worn by Henry the Eighth's beef

eaters.

Mary.

Beef-eaters, mamma! I never heard

such a comical name.

Mrs. M. It is a strange corruption of a very plain word, buffetier, a person who waits at a buffet, or sideboard.

Richard. But do you suppose every body was as fine in Henry the Eighth's time as those beefeaters? Why you know, mamma, their clothes are all in stripes of red and yellow.

Mrs. M. I fancy that the style of dress was wonderfully gay and showy; and, because the king was a fat burly man, the courtiers stuffed out their clothes to make themselves look as big as he did : but though the rest of the dress was so wide and baggy, it was thought proper that the sleeve should fit as tightly as possible, and some of the fine gen

tlemen had their sleeves sewed up every time they

put them on.

George. O, what a plague, to have one's coat sewed on every morning!

Mrs. M. I should suppose that so troublesome a fashion must have been confined to very frivolous and idle people; but that the dress of the courtiers was aped by people of a much lower degree is clear enough from a story I have met with. John Drakes, a shoemaker, was a great admirer of one of the courtiers' (sir Philip Calthorp's) style of dress, and prevailed with his tailor to make him some clothes which should be exactly like sir Philip's. Sir Philip having ordered a new cloak, the fellow to it was accordingly made for John Drakes: which the knight hearing of, gave directions to the tailor to cut little slits all over his cloak. As the shoemaker's cloak was to be exactly like sir Philip's, the tailor cut it also in the same way and this, as the story goes, completely cured John Drakes of aping sir Philip Calthorp. The convenience of ladies' dress was very much assisted about this time by the invention of pins.

:

Mary. I cannot think how they could fasten on their clothes before they had pins.

Mrs. M. There were a variety of contrivances, buttons, hooks and eyes, laces, and loops; and ladies used even wooden skewers to fasten on their dress. A needle must have been a very valuable

VOL. II.

D

implement at this time. None were made in England till the next reign, when a Spanish negro came to London, and made some; but, as he refused to discover his art, they were not manufactured in any considerable quantity till some time after.

A gentleman and lady in the dress of Queen Mary's reign.

As soon as Edward had breathed his last, the duke of Northumberland went to Sion-house, where lady Jane Grey lived, and saluted her as queen: but she, far from being ambitious of this dignity, entreated that it might not be forced upon her, and pleaded the superior claims of the two princesses. But the duke had gone too far to be stopped in his career by the scruples of a young creature

of sixteen; and lady Jane, who was naturally of a timid and gentle disposition, was soon overborne by the violence of her father-in-law, and suffered herself to be proclaimed.—But no applause followed the proclamation, and no one seconded this bold step of Northumberland. Lady Jane, after an imaginary and joyless reign of ten days, thankfully returned from the royal apartments in the Tower, in which she had been placed, to the privacy of her own house: and the princess Mary, arriving from her retreat in Suffolk, was welcomed by the people with the loudest acclamations. For though the consequences of her stern bigotry were dreaded by those of the new religion, they yet dreaded still more the unprincipled character of Northumberland.

The duke himself had little reason to rejoice in the temporary success of his schemes, which brought him nothing but a short period of feverish anxiety, followed by the bitterest disappointment and despair. When he saw his project entirely overthrown, he sought to save his own life by the meanest supplications. He fell on his knees before lord Arundel, who was sent by the queen to apprehend him; and while in that posture, a woman rushed up to him, and held a handkerchief to his face, which she told him was stained with the blood of his innocent victim the duke of Somerset. Northumberland was condemned, and beheaded on Tower-hill. His son Guildford and lady Jane were