Puritanism was somewhat successful in its fight against long hair, but when the periwig re-appeared, in the reign of Charles II., it proved too enticing for human vanity to resist. It probably succumbed at length to the very completeness of its victory. Not only men of dignity wore it, but many humbler men followed their example. " One finds," says Mr. Eggleston, " half-fed country schoolmasters in wigs ; tradesmen also proceeded to shave off their natural hair and don the mass of thread, silk, horsehair or women's hair, with which wigs of various kinds were compounded. Apprentice lads under twenty are described in advertisements of runaways lis wearing wigs ; hired servant^ aped the quality, and transported rogues were tricked out in wigs to make them marketable." After 1750 the decline of the ' wig began, but the natural hair was curled, frizzled.

HISTORY OF WESTCHESTER COUNTY.

powdered, queued and clubbed.' The rage for growing the longest possible switch of hair infected all classes ; sailors and boatmen wrapjjed in eelskin their cherished locks, and the back countryman was accustomed to preserve his by enveloping it in a piece of bear's gut dyed red, or clubbing it in a buckskin bag. Women wore the lofty " tower " or " commode" head-dress, which, in the exaggeration that preceded its abolition, usually exceeded in its height the length of the face below it. The Dutch dames did not fall victims to any of the eccentricities of fashion ; but with their close-fitting caps, velvet bodices, short and voluminous skirts -- the muslin petticoats crisp and stiff with starch -- the household keys hanging from their girdles and their capacious pockets filled with scissors, pin-cushion and other domestic tools, made a stubborn fight against the encroachments of the female dandyisms imported from across the Atlantic.