When Katherine of Braganza landed in England as Queen Consort of Charles II., she excited mirth by the stiff outlandish fashion in which her luxuriant tresses were done up by her Majesty’s “barber,” and her exceedingly ugly maids of honour. Indeed she had as little taste for dress as she had for the fine arts; though she _had_ a taste for music. In full court dress, however, she looked a handsome woman,—without studying how she might best become so. Pepys has recorded that he saw her and the King dining together once, on which occasion she wore a loose white wrapping gown, as was supposed to become her imaginary condition; and Pepys adds, that she looked handsomer in it than in her robes of state and ceremony. Mary Beatrice of Modena, the wife of James II., is remarkable for her detestation of _rouge_, and for her wearing it in obedience to her husband’s wishes. Ladies will be pleased to make a note, not so much of the fact as of the motive. Father Seraphine, her Capuchin confessor gave an impudent stare of horror when he beheld it; and as she murmured something about the paleness of her complexion, he exclaimed,—and in the very face of the King too,—“Madam, I would rather see your Majesty yellow or green than rouged;” at which the good lady fell a laughing, as servilely as a barrister at a judicial bad joke, such as Baron Alderson’s light puns, with which he cuts short heavy suits. This is almost the only trait of interest told in connection with her toilet. It was simply observed that in England she dressed as became her state; and in exile, as became a lady whose dower was stolen by William III. and appropriated to his own use. Apply it as he would, he could never look so well as the owner. She cared little for that of which Elizabeth thought so much; and when, in after-days, it was remarked that she dressed as plainly as a citizen’s wife, and wore no jewels, it was known that she had sold her jewels, to profit her son. As often happens with mothers who despoil themselves to benefit their boys, the gift profited neither the recipient nor the giver. The splendour of the silver ornaments of her toilet was well known; and the ladies of France could well appreciate the sacrifice, which was in truth no sacrifice to her who made it. Queen Mary II., if she rolled joyously over the couches from which her affectionate father had just before been rolled off, the unfilial romp was, at least, a _private_ bit of ingratitude. She did not, like her sister Anne, go to the play in a dress covered with orange ribbons. Mary, in her later days, patronized the cornette head-dresses of monumental elevation, and the _fontanges_, of which she was desirous to deprive, by royal decree too, the “city minxes;” but the ladies beyond Temple Bar would neither heed her decrees nor wear the high-crowned hat, which had fallen into disuse save by the _pagani_, and they continued to “flaunt in cornettes and top-knots, after her own gracious example.”