“You need only hear an account of our day! In the morning, discussions with workpeople and tradespeople over the choice of our dress! And what trouble do we not take to secure the last novelty, to choose all that is in the best taste, and to avoid any prejudice concerning a particular fashion!... Next comes the excessive labour of making our toilet, with all the attention necessary to ensure being well dressed....” The Comtesse de Mailly retired to rest every night with her hair dressed, and wearing all her diamonds. She used to call her tradespeople “her little cats.” High head-dresses came into fashion again for a short time, during the reign of gigantic paniers, and were worn with powder. It took a whole day to complete one of those monuments of the capillary art, which were of such enormous size, that according to “Le Mercure de France” of 1730, ladies could not sit in their coaches, but were obliged to kneel. “Their woolly white hair,” says Lady Mary Wortley Montague, who visited Paris at the time, “and fiery faces, make them look more like skinned sheep than human beings.” Mme. de Graffigny, the author of “Lettres Péruviennes,” protested against the high head-dress. She wore her hair powdered, but close to her head and covered with a little cap. This “little cap” was adopted by many women of rank, and for several years was worn by all Frenchwomen. Women of the people still wear round caps with two plaited wings coming forward on the temples, and called “le bat en l’œil.” “The bourgeoises have retained,” says “Le Livre de la Coiffure,” “the full-crowned cap, surrounded with ribbon twists or bows, with two lappets falling over the chignon, and frills of lace curving round the temples.” Some ephemeral fashions were introduced into France by the Polish princess Maria Leczinska, the wife of Louis XV. “Hongrelines” were worn, and polonaises, or “hongroises,” trimmed with “brandebourgs;” and, in 1729, embroidered mantillas of velvet and satin lined with ermine or other fur, the two ends finished with handsome tassels, that were tied behind the waist. The “palatine” was thus no longer a solitary German fashion on the banks of the Seine. Powder remained in vogue for more than half a century. No doubt the softness it conferred on the features, and the brilliancy it lent to the eyes, made it pleasing to everybody. It was still worn in 1760, and again in 1780, and after the Revolution it reappeared under the Directory in 1795.