I Must Here Observe That The English Hair-Dressers Are
Also Barbers, An Office However, Which They Perform Very Badly
Indeed; though I cannot but consider shaving as a far more proper
employment for these petit maitres than it is
For surgeons, who you
know in our country are obliged to shave us. It is incredible how
much the English at present Frenchify themselves; the only things
yet wanting are bags and swords, with which at least I have seen no
one walking publicly, but I am told they are worn at court.
In the morning it is usual to walk out in a sort of negligee or
morning dress, your hair not dressed, but merely rolled up in
rollers, and in a frock and boots. In Westminster, the morning
lasts till four or five o'clock, at which time they dine, and supper
and going to bed are regulated accordingly. They generally do not
breakfast till ten o'clock. The farther you go from the court into
the city, the more regular and domestic the people become; and there
they generally dine about three o'clock, i.e. as soon as the
business or 'Change is over.
Trimmed suits are not yet worn, and the most usual dress is in
summer, a short white waistcoat, black breeches, white silk
stockings, and a frock, generally of very dark blue cloth, which
looks like black; and the English seem in general to prefer dark
colours. If you wish to be full dressed, you wear black. Officers
rarely wear their uniforms, but dress like other people, and are to
be known to be officers only by a cockade in their hats.
It is a common observation, that the more solicitous any people are
about dress, the more effeminate they are. I attribute it entirely
to this idle adventitious passion for finery, that these people are
become so over and above careful of their persons; they are for
ever, and on every occasion, putting one another on their guard
against catching cold; "you'll certainly catch cold," they always
tell you if you happen to be a little exposed to the draught of the
air, or if you be not clad, as they think, sufficiently warm. The
general topic of conversation in summer, is on the important objects
of whether such and such an acquaintance be in town, or such a one
in the country. Far from blaming it, I think it natural and
commendable, that nearly one half of the inhabitants of this great
city migrate into the country in summer. And into the country, I
too, though not a Londoner, hope soon to wander.
Electricity happens at present to be the puppet-show of the English.
Whoever at all understands electricity is sure of being noticed and
successful. This a certain Mr. Katterfelto experiences, who gives
himself out for a Prussian, speaks bad English, and understands
beside the usual electrical and philosophical experiments, some
legerdemain tricks, with which (at least according to the papers) he
sets the whole world in wonder.
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