In the early seventies we find our old friend _Punch_ again upon the warpath, and the Venus of Milo dons the crinoletta! This, however, is only a repetition of his satire on the crinoline in his "Essence of Parliament," May, 1860:-- "Lord Aberdeen's son, Lord Haddock, or some such name, made a supremely ridiculous speech upon the impropriety of allowing money to any school of Art in which the undraped she-model was studied from. His father, who was called Athenian Aberdeen, and has so earnest a love for Greek Art that he actually favoured Russia because she has a Greek Church, ought to have cured his Haddock of such nonsense. Poor old Mr. Spooner, naturally, took the same really indelicate view of the case. Sir George Lewis expressed his lofty contempt for the Haddock, and Lord Palmerston kippered him in a speech full of good fun. It is impossible that the same country which contains Macdowell's Eve, and Bailey's Eve at the Fountain, can hold Haddock and Spooner. Mr. Punch must avow that he prefers keeping the diviner images, and somehow getting rid of the coarser ones. Pam wanted to know whether the latter would like to stick crinoline on the models, or would be content with African garb. The other Wiscount observed, with more truth than politeness, 'Nude, indeed! I knewed Addock was a Nass.'" [Illustration: THE CRINOLETTA DISFIGURANS. AN OLD PARASITE IN A NEW FORM. _By Linley Sambourne ("Punch")._] An illustration is appended to the article of a figure resembling a fish in the act of adjusting a crinoline on the Venus de Medici. The crinoline rests upon the shoulders of the statue like a huge extinguisher. As previously hinted, the crinoletta was only a faint echo of the glories of its earlier prototype. It was a cylindrical contrivance, made up of steels or whalebones, either covered with a series of flounces, or worn underneath the dress like a big bustle. In fact, it began as a bustle, and gradually extended its proportions, wagging and swaying from side to side like the tail of a dragon, as the wearer moved. One well remembers--shall we, indeed, ever forget?--these singular "contraptions" displayed unblushingly in drapers' shops, and even hanging in bundles at the doors. "Hang out our banners on the outward walls; The cry is still, 'They come.'" FOOTNOTES: [16] Fairholt, "Costume in England." VII COLLARS AND CUFFS "_Theodorus._ Have they not also houses to set their ruffes in, to trim them and to trick them, as well as to starch them in? "_Amphilogus._ Yea, marry have they, for either the same starching houses do serve the turn, or else they have their other chambers and secret closets to the same use, wherein they tricke up these cartwheeles of the divels charet of pride, leading the direct way to the dungeon of hell." STUBBES, _Anatomy of Abuses_. VII COLLARS AND CUFFS