History of Westchester County, New York, Vol. I
A large, flat, white beaver was once worn, with scarcely any crown, and fastened under the chin by two strings. The only kind of wrap used by the ladies was the loose cloak which, with slight alterations in the cut, went by the names of roquelaure, capuchin and cardinal. After the Revolution the influence of French fashions was felt throughout the republic. American ladies wore the limp-skirted, short-waisted dress of the dames dii Directoire about the time that their husbands and beaux, having discarded the long-cherished cue, wore their hair closecropped, h la Brutus.
Parasols came in fashion very late; so with umbrel-
MANNEKS AND CUSTOMS.
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las. Men wore "rain coats," and women "camblets," for protection against the weather. Watson says the first umbrellas were carried by British officers, and were deemed effeminate by the people. Yet, in an old advertisement of 171)9, a milliner proposes, in addition to her regular modish business, to " cover umbrellas in the neatest manner ;" that useful article must have become common already at that time. Ladies careful of their complexion at one period wore a black velvet mask in winter, " with a silver mouth-piece to keep it on by retaining in the mouth." Rather an inconvenient arrangement and one which compelled silence. The earliest kind of watches worn in the colony had cases of shagreen, turtle shell or pinchbeck. After that the finest gentleman was content to carry a silver watch- The first gold watches were an article of jewelry, becoming only to wealthy and fiishionable ladies. Old gentlemen, at the close of the last century, carried a tall, gold-headed cane, and, generally, a gold snuti' box, from which they were ever ready to offer a sociable pinch to an acquaintance. They held on to the very last against the abolishment of the cue or pig-tail, and clung to the large silver buttons, which were once a mark of wealth and dignity.