Maurice Poucet, a famous preacher, protested from the pulpit against such profuse expenditure; and the Duc de Joyeuse, meeting him on one occasion, exclaimed with indignation, “I have often heard of you, and how you make the people laugh by your sermons.” “It is right that I should make them laugh,” the preacher coldly replied; “since you make them weep over the subsidies and great expenses of your wedding.” Joyeuse withdrew without daring to strike Poucet, as he had intended to do. The king and Joyeuse were dressed precisely alike at the wedding of the latter. They were covered with embroidery, pearls, and precious stones. Like the court ladies, they were scented with cordial water, civet, musk, ambergris, and aromatic substances; their ruffs were starched and goffered. They carried off the palm from the “poupins.” Following their example, the dandies of the time not only adopted the Italian turn-over collars, but attired themselves in such a fashion as to attract the bitterest satire. The following lines were aimed at Joyeuse and his imitators:— “Ce petit popeliret, Frisé, fraisé, blondelet, Dont la reluisante face Fait même honte à la glace, Et la délicate peau Au plus beau teint d’un tableau; Ce muguet dont la parole Est blèze, mignarde et molle; Le pied duquel, en marchant, N’iroit un œuf escachant, L’autre jour prit fantaisie De s’épouser à Marie, Vêtue aussi proprement, Peu s’en faut, que son (galant). Et, venant devant le temple, Le prêtre, qui les contemple, Demande, facétieux: ‘Quel est l’époux de vous deux?’”[23] The starched ruffs, or fluted collars, at first so fashionable at the court of Henri III., and then capriciously discarded, made their appearance once more, extraordinarily improved, for the king’s own wear. This was in 1578. The king appeared wearing a ruff made of fifteen breadths of cambric, and half a yard in depth. “To see his head against that ruff,” said Pierre de l’Estoile, “put one in the mind of St. John the Baptist’s head on a charger.” But the king’s triumph was complete; and his favourites were equal to the occasion, and expressed rapturous admiration of his good taste. Being a true amateur in the matter of fluted collars, he had judged that ordinary starch would not suffice to hold up such a quantity of material as stiffly as was necessary, and the king of France had deigned to invent a sublime mixture; his august hands had obtained a satisfactory result from rice flour, and he had duly experimented upon it! From the combination of the masculine and feminine styles, dress in general had assumed an ungraceful stiffness. The attire of Henri III. was considered monstrous by the serious minds of the time. D’Aubigné exclaimed: “Si, qu’au premier abord, chacun estoit en peine S’il voyoit un roi-femme ou bien un homme-reine.”[24]