THE TIRING-BOWERS OF QUEENS. "I could accuse the gaiety of your wardrobe And show like bonfires on you, by the tapers: LET us not presume to look into the primitive boudoirs of the Queens before the Conquest, and only reverently into those of the sovereign ladies who succeeded. "Tread lightly, this is sacred ground!" is an injunction not to be forgotten in this locality. The first Queen after the Norman invasion, Matilda of Flanders, who was pummelled into loving her ungallant wooer William, had a costly wardrobe. Before her death, she disposed of the most valuable of her garments by will, and named therein the dressmaker who had provided them for her, a species of advertisement that ought to have made Madame Alderet's fortune. "I give," says the royal testatrix, "to the Abbey of the Holy Trinity my tunic, worked at Winchester, by Alderet's wife; and the mantle embroidered with gold, which is in my chamber, to make a cope. Of my two golden girdles, I give that which is ornamented with emblems, for the purpose of suspending the lamp before the great altar." The abbey named was at Caen, and the nuns connected therewith came in for all Matilda's petticoats,—no indifferent legacy, for they were stiff with gold and dust. She was an elegant dresser, as far as outside show was concerned. Rufus was a bachelor, and the ladies who frequented his uproarious court were remarkable for their adoption of garments which very much disgusted the sober ladies of Saxon times. Matilda of Scotland, wife of Henry I., being graceful of form, was given to wear tight kirtles, and may be said to have brought in tight lacing. Henry's second wife, Adalicia of Louvaine, imitated the fashion set by her predecessor. On the King's death, she espoused the hereditary cupbearer, William de Albini, surnamed Fortembras; and if she dressed a trifle less gloriously in her bower at Arundel Castle, she at least became there the mother of a numerous progeny, who grew up and gave the fashions to the entire county of Sussex. The third Matilda, she of Boulogne, wife of Stephen, was the first of our Queens who introduced simplicity of dress. On ordinary occasions she was perhaps less plainly dressed than the very elegant inmates of that very elegant "St. Katherine's College," which still commemorates her benevolence, and whose inmates are doubtless a cause of some astonishment to the spirit of that gentle lady. Eleanora of Aquitaine, ex-wife of Louis XI. of France, and consort of Henry II. of England, was extravagant in the article of dress, and loved to see her ladies around her splendidly attired. She ran their purses hard, for, like Marie Antoinette, she was exceedingly fond of private theatricals; and the barons who groaned over the cost of their own armour, looked grim at the bill of outlay for materials which, be it said for the honour of the parties concerned, were made up for the most part by the young ladies themselves. In those days, people used to resort to the pleasant and sweetsmelling village of Bermondsey, to see the well-dressed Eleanor walk in the quaint gardens there. The idea of Bermondsey being pleasant and sweet-smelling is one now to smile at. It is in these times the seat of ill odours, amid which however many a quean still walks and keeps her state, --and a very sad state it is. Berengaria, the spouse of the first Richard, is one of the two Queens of England who never were in England. Her tiring maidens found in her a gentle lady who gave grace to, rather than borrowed it from, what she wore. It may be added that she wore nothing that was not wet with her tears; for her royal spouse was like most knights of his day, ready to make and ready to break all vows of fidelity, and indeed all promises, of whatsoever quality. But Richard was not parsimonious, like his brother John, who kept poor Isabella of Angoulême as poorly dressed as a scrivener's wife; and who wrote down what cloth she was to have for her garments, and on what allowance of shoes she was to stand, all with the shopkeeping sort of correctness which is to be found in no king save Louis Philippe. Isabella however had some rich appurtenances in her wardrobe, for we find that when her son, the little Henry III., was crowned, the royal circlet not being procurable for the purpose, the boy was at length crowned with the gold throat-collar belonging to his mother's gala suit. That same Henry III. was as gorgeous a dresser as his father, but he loved to see not only his wife, the fair Eleanor of Provence, whom he gallantly married without a dower, but also her ladies, as gorgeously attired as himself. Had he been as careful of paying for their dresses as he was in the selection of them (he was a dreadful fop, and would discuss lace and frippery with a lady with as much unnecessary knowledge as any Belgian petit-maître of modern days), he might have passed reproachless. But he was one of those men who, after squandering their own money, squander that which they hold in trust; and then cheat their own tailors and their ladies' milliners with a composition of five shillings in the pound. Henry, his Queen, and court glittered like dragon-flies, thought nothing of "settling day," and turned up their noses at their more honest and less gaily-dressed kindred. The result was what might be expected. They got into pecuniary difficulties, and descended to the commission of intense meanness. They invited themselves out daily to dine with the wealthy aristocracy of London, whose dinners they ate and whose plate they carried away with them as a gift or a loan. In fact, Henry and Eleanor established a fashion which is far from being obsolete, so great is the authority for its observance. The extravagant are always mean, mean and dishonest; they first cheat their creditors, and then would cheat their more judicious relatives, were the latter weak enough to be persuaded that the very attempt is a compliment. I could not of course, but you, good reader, can put your finger on a score of people who are like Henry and Eleanor in this,-living beyond their means, and looking to their more honest friends for aid to relieve them from the consequences of their knavery. Exactly; I see you smile as your eye falls on that pair of cousins of yours, the lady all flounce, and the cavalier irreproachable in dress, and in nought besides! He has just asked you, a man with eight children, four hundred a year, and two servants, to put your name to that little bill. But you have been singed at that fire before, and you now decline. My dear Sir, if you will not allow yourself to be cheated by your extravagant relations, you cannot expect to be on good terms with that part of your family. But you will find compensation for the loss of such a luxury at your own hearth and in your own heart. Why should you wrong those who cluster about both to help worthless people, who, if they could, would further do as Henry and Eleanor did, pawn the "Virgin Mary" to pay their jewellers' bills. That precious couple compelled the sheriffs of various counties to furnish them with linen for their royal persons. Had I been a sheriff at the time, they should have had huckaback, compared with which they would have found a hair-shirt a positive luxury! And let me hope, young ladies, that you will not confound this Eleanora with her of the following reign, that Eleanora of Castile, who was surnamed the "faithful," and who was the glorious first wife of Edward I. She showed what an excellent eye she had to comfort, by introducing into the cold, damp dwellings of the day, tapestry hangings to protect the inmates from chill and moisture. She was the royal mother of all good English housewives; although she did a little scandalize the sober matrons by wearing long curls adown her peerless neck, after she was married. There were some, too, who did not complacently admire her habit of dressing in public; but it was only a public of ladies. It was for Elizabeth, in later days, to attire herself in presence of men. In Eleanor's oriel at Caernarvon Castle, ladies were presented to the daughter of Castile, while her tirewomen combed and braided her renowned long tresses. A contemporary poet thus describes the Scene: "In her oriel there she was, the poetry of which is of as poor a quality as was probably the glass in the oriel. We must not forget to add, that there was as much sewing as romping, and an abundance of both among the young princesses (of whom there was a noisy abundance too) in the " Maiden's Hall" at Westminster Palace; and that Eleanor is immortalized as the only sovereign who bequeathed "a legacy to William, her tailor." When she died, Edward made solemn oath of sempiternal grief, and, in a week or two, took to flirting. Ulti |