Another female practice, then, was to go to daily service at church especially--and St. Paul's, Covent Garden, was a very fashionable church at which to worship, or ogle the beaus.[136] 'This Market and that Church,' says my friend, 'hides more faults of kind Wives and Daughters among the Neighbouring Inhabitants than the pretended Visits either to my Cousin at t'other end of the Town, or some other distant Acquaintance; for if the Husband asks, Where have you been, Wife? or the Parent, Where have you been, Daughter? the Answer, if it be after Eleven in the forenoon, or between Three and Four in the Afternoon, is, At Prayers. But, if early in the Morning, then their excuse is, I took a walk to Covent Garden Market, not being very well, to refresh myself with the scent of the Herbs and Flowers; Bringing a Flower, or a Sprig of Sweet Bryar, home in her Hand, and it confirms the matter.' [Footnote 136: _The London Spy._] When not walking, ladies used either a coach or a sedan chair, and but seldom rode on horseback; but, when they did so, they generally preferred the pillion to the side-saddle, as in the accompanying illustration, and held on by the belt either of her cavalier or groom. In the country, horse exercise was much more in vogue, and Swift repeatedly alludes to, and reminds Stella of, her riding. When riding, ladies very frequently wore masks to protect the countenance from the rays of the sun. [Illustration: Riding Pillion.] Frequent allusions are made to a lady's pets, her lap-dog or her parrot; but very few people know the very wide range of choice she had in the selection of those pets. Needless to say there were monkeys, both Marmoset and other kinds; there were paroquets, paroquets of Guinea, cockatoos and macaws, scarlet nightingales from the West Indies, lorries or lurries, canaries, both ash and lemon colour, white and grey turtle doves from Barbary, white turtle doves, and the turtle doves from Moco, no bigger than a lark, spotted very fine. There were milk-white peacocks, white and pyed pheasants, bantams, and furbelow fowls from the East Indies, and top-knot hens from Hamburg. She would hardly want the 'Parcel of living Vipers, fresh taken, fat and good, are to be sold by the dozen,' nor would she care about the 'fine Tyger from the East Indies, who was brought over together with some fine geese from the same part of the world,' and some 'Amedawares.' In fact there were 'Jamrachs' then as now, and many of the bird shops were in St. Martin's Lane, near which locality they still abound. There is a curious advertisement in the _Postman_, January 12/15, 1706, which settles the date of bird-seed glasses. 'The so much approved and most convenient new fashion Crystal Bird Glasses, which effectually prevent the Littering of the Seeds into the Rooms.'