[Illustration: FIG. 72.--A stocking with clocks.] The vestige in modern stockings to which allusion has been made is very often present, and takes the form of the ornament which we know as a "clock." The name signifies a gusset, and in modern socks and so on, which are woven or knitted all in one piece, no such arrangement is to be found. Stockings, however, like those at first worn by Queen Elizabeth, and used at least by American settlers until the year 1675, were made up from pieces of cloth. In these there would be seams down the sides, and it is possible that where the ornamental lines meet in Figure 72 there may have been a gusset. In any case, it is evident that the intention of the clock was to hide the side seams. Of recent years, when ladies have most sensibly adopted short skirts, the clock has developed into a series of embroidered patterns which cover the front of the foot and ankle. The parentage of these is quite evident from the shape, which is shown in Figure 73. [Illustration: FIG. 73.--An embroidered stocking showing the further evolution of the clock (date 1900).] [Illustration: FIG. 74.--An open-work stocking of 1905.] This ornamentation has been carried still further, though it is not produced in the same way. The patterns, instead of being embroidered, are the result of perforations, or, in more technical language, "open-work," and the background which shows up the design is no longer the material of the stockings, but the skin of their fair wearers. (See Figure 74.) In many cases the stockings are dark in colour, and the effect of tattooing is produced without the preliminary pain and inconvenience. We have here an instance of the way in which the specially human instinct of decorating the body persists, and at the same time a development of the fashion for displaying, in the daytime under a thin veil of gauze or lace, the necks and arms which since the time of our grandmothers have only been allowed to appear uncovered in the evening. Leather stockings were once worn, for example, by William Penn, and they and the leggings of to-day may be a direct survival from the time when our ancestors, though still wearing skins, had learnt to dress them. Leggings, as such, are possibly connected more closely with the protection of man against man than with that of man against the weather, and in that case their history is bound up with that of armour. Gaiters, under the name of spatter-dashes, were originally part of a soldier's uniform. To-day, when worn by civilians in ordinary dress, they are quite short, and go by the contracted name of "spats." Pedestrians still wear the full-sized gaiters in conjunction with knickerbockers, and white gaiters are a feature of Highland regiments. Long Florentine hose, which practically took the place of trousers and stockings together, are now represented by what are called "tights," and are to be seen in the dress of acrobats. We shall allude to these again.