and relating what had passed betwixt her and the santon, he told them the place where she was interred. The officers immediately went to the grotto, seized Barsisa, and found the princess's body in the place to which the devil had directed them; whereupon they took up the corpse, and carried that and the santon to the palace.

When the king saw his daughter dead, and was informed of the whole event, he broke out into tears and bitter lamentations; and assembling the doctors, he laid the santon's crime before them, and asked their advice how he should be punished. All the doctors condemned him to death, upon which the king ordered him to be hanged. Accordingly, a gibbet was erected: the hermit went up the ladder, and when he was going to be turned off, the devil whispered in his ear these words: O santon! if you will worship me, I will extricate you out of this difficulty, and transport you two thousand leagues from hence, into a country where you shall be reverenced by men as much as you were before this adventure.' 'I am content,' says Barsisa; deliver me, and I will worship thee.' 'Give me first a sign of adoration,' replies the devil. Whereupon the santon bowed his head, and said, 'I give myself to you.' The devil then raising his voice, said, 'O Barsisa, I am satisfied; I have obtained what I desired;' and with these words, spitting in his face, he disappeared; and the deluded santon was hanged".

2 This and several preceding papers are in this edition ascribed to Steele, with dubiety, and in default of authorities for other assignments. See final note on Nos. 10. 15; and introductory note to No. 151.

No. 149. TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 1, 1713.*

· Uretur vestis amore tuæ.

Your very dress shall captivate his heart.

OVID.

a

I HAVE in a former precaution endeavoured to shew the mechanism of an epic poem, and given the reader prescriptions whereby he may, without the scarce ingredient of a genius, compose the several parts of that great work. I shall now treat of an affair of more general importance, and make dress the subject of the following paper.

Dress is grown of universal use in the conduct of life. Civilities and respect are only paid to appearIt is a varnish that gives a lustre to every action, a passe par tout that introduces us into all polite assemblies, and the only certain method of making most of the youth of our nation conspicuous.

There was formerly an absurd notion among the men of letters, that to establish themselves in the character of wits, it was absolutely necessary to show a contempt of dress. This injudicious affectation of theirs flattened all their conversation, took off the force of every expression, and incapacitated a female audience from giving attention to any thing they said. While the man of dress catches their eyes as well as ears, and at every ludicrous turn obtains a laugh of applause by way of compliment.

I shall lay down as an established maxim, which hath been received in all ages, that no person can dress without a genius.

*GAY'S.

a See No. 78.

A genius is never to be acquired by art, but is the gift of nature; it may be discovered even in infancy. Little master will smile when you shake his plume of feathers before him, and thrust its little knuckles in papa's full-bottom; miss will toy with her mother's Mechlin lace, and gaze on the gaudy colours of a fan; she smacks her lips for a kiss at the appearance of a gentleman in embroidery, and is frighted at the indecency of the house-maid's blue apron: as she grows up, the dress of her baby begins to be her care, and you will see a genteel fancy open itself in

the ornaments of the little machine.

We have a kind of sketch of dress, if I may so call it, among us, which as the invention was foreign, is called a dishabille: every thing is thrown on with a loose and careless air; yet a genius discovers itself even through this negligence of dress, just as you may see the masterly hand of a painter in three or four swift strokes of the pencil.

The most fruitful in geniuses is the French nation ; we owe most of our janty fashions now in vogue, to some adept beau among them. Their ladies exert the whole scope of their fancies upon every new petticoat; every head-dress undergoes a change; and not a lady of genius will appear in the same shape two days together; so that we may impute the scarcity of geniuses in our climate to the stagnation of fashions.

The ladies among us have a superior genius to the men; which have for some years past shot out in several exorbitant inventions for the greater consumption of our manufacture. While the men have contented themselves with the retrenchment of the hat, or the various scallop of the pocket, the ladies have sunk the head-dress, inclosed themselves in the circumference of the hoop-petticoat; furbelows and

flounces have been disposed of at will, the stays have been lowered behind, for the better displaying the beauties of the neck; not to mention the various rolling of the sleeve, and those other nice circumstances of dress upon which every lady employs her fancy at pleasure.

The sciences of poetry and dress have so near an alliance to each other, that the rules of the one, with very little variation, may serve for the other.

As in a poem all the several parts of it must have a harmony with the whole; so to keep to the propriety of dress, the coat, waistcoat, and breeches must be of the same piece".

As Aristotle obliges all dramatic writers to a strict observance of time, place, and action, in order to compose a just work of this kind of poetry; so it is also absolutely necessary for a person that applies himself to the study of dress, to have a strict regard to these three particulars.

To begin with the time. What is more absurd than the velvet gown in summer? and what more agreeable in the winter? the muff and fur are preposterous in June, which are charmingly supplied by the Turkey handkerchief and the fan. Every thing must be suitable to the season, and there can be no propriety in dress without a strict regard to time.

You must have no less respect to place. What gives a lady a more easy air than the wrapping gown in the morning at the tea-table? The Bath countenances the men of dress in showing themselves at the pump in their Indian night gowns, without the least inde

corum.

b I should not have suspected this. Prior as an ambassador is in a Scotch snuff-coloured coat turned up with large cuffs of white satin, embroidered with a border of coloured flowers, which is the pattern of his waistcoat. A.

Action is what gives the spirit both to writing and dress. Nothing appears graceful without action; the head, the arms, the legs, must all conspire to give a habit a genteel air. What distinguishes the air of the court from that of the country but action? A lady, by the careless toss of her head, will show a set of ribands to advantage; by a pinch of snuff judiciously taken will display the glittering ornament of her little finger; by the new modelling her tucker, at one view present you with a fine turned hand, and a rising bosom. In order to be a proficient in action, I cannot sufficiently recommend the science of dancing this will give the feet an easy gait, and the arms a gracefulness of motion. If a person have not a strict regard to these three above-mentioned rules of antiquity, the richest dress will appear stiff and affected, and the most gay habit fantastical and taudry.

As different sorts of poetry require a different style: the elegy, tender and mournful; the ode, gay and sprightly; the epic, sublime, &c. so must the widow confess her grief in the veil; the bride frequently makes her joy and exultation conspicuous in the silver brocade; and the plume and the scarlet die is requisite to give the soldier a martial air. There is another kind of occasional dress in use among the ladies; I mean the riding habit, which some have not injudiciously styled the hermaphroditical, by reason of its masculine and feminine composition; but I shall rather choose to call it the Pindaric, as its first institution was at a Newmarket horse-race, and as it is a mixture of the sublimity of the epic with the easy softness of the ode.

There sometimes arises a great genius in dress, who cannot content himself with merely copying from others, but will, as he sees occasion, strike out into the long pocket, slashed sleeve, or something