The beautiful Mme. de Sampajo, the attached friend of Louis Philippe and his family, was enumerating, on one occasion, all the costumes she provided herself with at the beginning of each year. “I was forgetting,” she said, “to mention my dress for the days on which the king or his family are fired at....” It is a fact that regicides abounded under the Monarchy of July; and as often as Louis Philippe escaped unhurt from some attempt on his life, ladies would hastily dress themselves in some simply shaped, dark-coloured costume, and present themselves at the Tuileries, to offer him their congratulations. Such costumes were always kept in readiness in a wardrobe, and were known as “costumes for days on which the king’s life is attempted.” In the annals of fashion, the reign of Louis Philippe is remarkable only for “romantic costume” at first, and afterwards for the “classical costume” inspired by Rachel. It must not be inferred, however, that the reign of Fancy had ceased to exist. Many trifles, light and fragile as roses, exist like roses, for one day only. And every woman is the willing slave of Fashion, however extraordinary it may be, so that by dressing like others, she may avoid the appearance of singularity. A sort of rivalry existed in 1834, concerning bouquets for balls. Five or six camelias, mixed with green leaves, were placed in the centre of a pyramidal nosegay consisting of violets, ferns, and small hot-house flowers. These bouquets were placed in a gilt or jewelled holder, to which was attached a ring and chain; the bouquet, therefore, might be allowed to fall, and would yet remain suspended to the finger. [Illustration] CHAPTER XXIV. THE SECOND REPUBLIC. 1848 TO 1851. Tricoloured stuffs of 1848—Girondin mantles—Open gowns—Summer dresses—Kasawecks and their derivatives—Beaver bonnets; velvet bonnets, and satin or crape drawn bonnets—Cloches, Cornelia, Moldavian, and Josephine cloaks; mantles—Isly green—Opera cloaks—Numerous styles of dressing the hair: à la Marie Stuart, à la Valois, Léda, Proserpine, and Ceres—Marquise parasols—Jewellery—Straw bonnets—“Orleans” and “armure”—Work reticule or bag—“Chinés”—Pagoda sleeves—Waistcoats; basque bodices—New and economical canezous. The Revolution of 1848 lasted too short a time to effect a change in dress. There is little to remark in that transient period, beyond the adoption of tricoloured materials in remembrance of 1830. Tricoloured ribbons were worn on caps, and on a few bonnets. For some months Girondin cloaks, with three rows of shaded lace, were in fashion; the cloaks were of muslin, and trimmed with frills worked in button-hole stitch. Bronze was the favourite colour for mantles.