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than in bed. Alas, my heart! I went to the theatre the other night to see Macbeth, Thane of Cawdor, in the character of Mr. * *, and I will do Macbeth the justice to say that he played the part to perfection. The assumed character shone through the actor's own individuality, like a lamp through a lighted alabaster Yet am I fain to confess that I felt tired-oh! how tired—ere yet the play was half over; and when Lady Macbeth, coming on with a bedroom candlestick in her hand, exclaimed, "To bed! to bed!"-" Sweetest of ladies," quoth I, "I will e'en take you at your word;" and so saying, I snatched up my hat, walked out of the house, and made for my bed with all possible expedition.

IT

FOPS AND FOPPERY.

is honorably significant of the progress of civilization that foppery is everywhere disappearing. Fops by whatever phrase designated, whether as "fops" proper, "beaux," "macaronis," "sparks," "dandies," "bucks," "petits maîtres," "Bond Street loungers," "exquisites," or " Corinthians," have wellnigh vanished from the world. Their very names have become enigmatic. To trace from age to age through all its phases of development the history of these popinjays of fashion were a task not unworthy of satirist or philosopher. It would be interesting to observe the grotesque inspirations of folly as illustrated in the careers of her most fantastic votaries. If not

more virtuous, we are certainly of graver deportment than our fathers, and there is hardly a man of sense among us who will not say with Shakespeare in The Merchant of Venice, "Let not the sound of shallow foppery enter my sober house." The fop of the Elizabethan era is doubtless typified accurately in the person of Osrick. How pungently does Hamlet satirize the "waterfly," and how amusingly does he mimic his mincing mode of speech! "To divide him inventorially would dizzy the arithmetic of memory, and yet but saw neither, in respect of his quick sail. But, in the verity of extolment, I take him to be a soul of great article, and his infusion of such dearth and rareness as to make true diction of him. His semblable is his mirror, and, who else would trace him, his umbrage nothing more." This crabbed English is a sarcastic skit upon the affected phraseology of men who aped ton in Shakespeare's time. In Hudibras we find mention of a creature known as a "fopdoodle." have been roaming," says Butler,

"Where sturdy butchers broke your noddle,

And handled you like a fopdoodle."

"You

The "fopdoodle" now exists only in the dictionary. He is no great loss, for his name was sufficiently expressive of his silliness. The fop had a long reign, and figures prominently in the literature of the last two centuries. In the old play of The Magnetic Lady, his qualities are summed up with delicate precision. He is pictured as

"A courtier extraordinary, who by diet

Of meats and drinks, his temperate exercise,
Choice music, frequent bath, his horary shifts

Of shirts and waistcoats, means to immortalize
Mortality itself, and makes the essence

Of his whole happiness the trim of curls."

Swift, who seldom lost an opportunity of expressing his contempt for the sex which he used so vilely, is particularly severe upon women for their partiality for fools, fops and rakes:

"In a dull stream which moving slow,
You hardly see the current flow,

When a small breeze obstructs the course,
It whirls about for want of force;

And in its narrow circle gathers

Nothing but chaff, and straws, and feathers.

The current of a female mind

Stops thus and turns with every wind,

Thus whirling round together draws

Fools, fops, and rakes for chaff and straws."

Covent Garden would appear to have been the favorite place of rendezvous for fops in the time of Dryden, who observes that "farce scribblers make use of the noble invention of laughter to entertain citizens, country gentlemen, and Covent Garden fops."

The "Sparks" were in great force even in the time of Dr. Johnson, who describes them as "lively, showy, splendid gay men." They were of respectable antiquity, hailing probably from the days of the Restoration, when the nation expressed in costume, as in all things else, its wild delight at being emancipated from the grim bondage of Puritanism. The "beau," whom Johnson defined as a man of dress-a man whose great care is to deck his person," flourished most luxuriantly in the last century. His was the sumptuous age of powder

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and patches. He was especially dainty in the matters of sword-knots, shoe-buckles, and lace ruffles. He was ablaze with jewelry, took snuff with an incomparable air out of a box studded with diamonds, and excelled in the "nice conduct of a clouded cane." Age brought him no wisdom, but, on the contrary, rather served to give to his folly a more poignant aroma. He culminated into some such personage as Lord Ogilby in The Clandestine Marriage. It has been observed with some touch of wit that a beau dressed out resembled the cinnamon tree, the bark being of greater value than the body. The word "macaroni," as applied to a fop, is of curious origin. In its primary signification it means a kind of paste meat boiled in broth, and dressed with butter, cheese, and spice. How it came to be used for the designation of drolls and fools is explained by Addison in the Spectator. "There is a set of merry drolls whom the common people of all countries admire and seem to love so well that they could eat them, according to the old proverb; I mean those circumforaneous wits whom every nation calls by the name of that dish of meat which it loves best. In Holland they are termed 'pickled herrings,' in France Jean Potages,' in Italy 'macaronis,' and in Great Britain 'Jack Puddings."" The transference of the word from fools and clowns to men of fantastic refinement and exaggerated elegance is a singular circumstance, of which philologists have not as yet given a satisfactory explanation. That the phrase did undergo that strange metamorphosis of meaning is beyond all question. Sir Benjamin Backbite, in The School for Scandal, applies the word to horses of a good breed, as distinguished from those of inferior lineage:

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"Sure never were seen two such beautiful ponies,
Other horses are clowns, but these macaronis ;
To give them this title I'm sure can't be wrong,
Their legs are so slim and their tails are so long."

The human Macaronis had a pleasant time of it, but they were eventually supplanted by the "Dandies," who for several generations bore supreme sway in the realm of fantastic fashion. "Dandy" is traced by etymologists through "Jack-a-dandy," of which it is an abbreviation, to the French word "dandin; " but some grammarians are of opinion that the English term is borrowed from a very small coin of Henry VII.'s time, called a "dandiprat." Be this as it may, the "dandies" were for many a long year potentates whose influence was far too great to be measured by any coin, much less a dandiprat. They were probably at their prime in the days of the Regency, which epoch, however, they long survived. Lord Byron confesses to a predilection for them. “I like the dandies," he says, "they were always very civil to me; though in general they disliked literary people, and persecuted and mystified Madame de Staël, Lewis, Horace Twiss, and the like. The truth is that, though I gave up the business early, I had a tinge of dandyism in my minority, and probably retained enough of it to conciliate the great ones at four-and-twenty." Lord Glenbervie foreshadowed the fall of the dandies, and luxuriated in the anticipation:-"The expressions 'bluestocking' and 'dandy' may furnish matter for the learning of commentators at some future period. At this moment every English reader will understand them. Our present ephemeral dandy is akin to the Macaroni of my earlier days. The first of those expressions has become classical, by Mrs. Hannah More's poem of ' Bas

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