"Les Parisiens," writes Mercier, "achètent quatre ajustemens contre une chemise. Un beau Monsieur se met une chemise blanche tous les quinze jours. Il coud ses manchettes de dentelle sur une chemise sale," and powders over his point collar till it looks white.[503] This habit passed into a proverb. The Maréchal de Richelieu, who, though versed in astronomy, could not spell, said of himself, "Qu'on ne lui avoit pas fourni des chemises, mais qu'il avoit acheté des {172}manchettes."[504] This account tallies well with former accounts[505] and with a letter of Madame de Maintenon to the Princess des Ursins, 1710.[506] At this period it was the custom for grisettes to besiege the Paris hotels, bearing on their arms baskets decked out with ruffles and jabots of Malines, Angleterre, and point. What reader of Sterne will not recollect the lace-seller in his _Sentimental Journey_? The jabot and manchettes of points were the customary "cadeau de noces" of the bride to her intended for his wedding dress--a relic of which practice may be found in the embroidered wedding shirt furnished by the lady, in the North of Europe.[507] The sums expended in these articles would now appear fabulous. The Archbishop of Cambray[508] alone possessed four dozen pairs of ruffles, Malines, point, and Valenciennes. The Wardrobe Bills of the Duke de Penthièvre of 1738 make mention of little else. An ell and a quarter of lace was required for one pair of ruffles. A yard, minus 1/16, sufficed for the jabot.[509] There were manchettes de jour, manchettes tournantes,[510] and manchettes de nuit: these last-named were mostly of Valenciennes.[511] The {173}point d'Alençon ruffles of Buffon, which he always wore, even when writing, were exhibited in 1864 at Falaise, being carefully preserved in the family to whom they have descended. Even, if a contemporary writer may be credited, "Monsieur de Paris," the executioner, mounted the scaffold in a velvet suit, powdered, with point lace jabot and ruffles. "Les rubans, les miroirs, les dentelles sont trois choses sans lesquelles les François ne peuvent vivre. Le luxe démesuré a confondu le maître avec le valet,"[512] says an unknown writer, quoted by Dulaure.[513] The servants of the last century had on their state liveries lace equal in richness to that worn by their masters.[514] Of a Prussian gentleman, we read, "His valets, who according to the reigning tastes were the prettiest in the world, wore nothing but the most costly lace."[515] This custom was not confined, however, to France or the Continent. "Our very footmen," writes the angry _World_, "are adorned with gold and {174}silver bags and lace ruffles. The valet is only distinguished from his master by being better dressed;" while the _Connoisseur_ complains of "roast beef being banished from even 'down stairs,' because the powdered footmen will not touch it for fear of daubing their lace ruffles."[516]