Costumes of Englishwomen of the Seventeenth Century. Costumes of Englishwomen of the Seventeenth Century. CHAPTER III ATTIRE OF VIRGINIA DAMES AND THEIR NEIGHBORS “Two things I love, two usuall thinges they are: The Firste, New-fashioned cloaths I love to wear, Newe Tires, newe Ruffes; aye, and newe Gestures too In all newe Fashions I do love to goe. The Second Thing I love is this, I weene To ride aboute to have those Newe Cloaths scene. “At every Gossipping I am at still And ever wilbe—maye I have my will. For at ones own Home, praie—who is’t can see How fyne in new-found fashioned Tyres we bee? Vnless our Husbands—Faith! but very fewe!— And whoo’d goe gaie, to please a Husband’s view? Alas! wee wives doe take but small Delight If none (besides our husbands) see that Sight” —“The Gossipping Wives Complaint,” 1611 (circa). CHAPTER III ATTIRE OF VIRGINIA DAMES AND THEIR NEIGHBORS I t is a matter of deep regret that no “Lists of Apparel” were made out for the women emigrants in any of the colonies. Doubtless many came who had a distinct allotment of clothing, among them the redemptioners. We know one case, that of the “Casket Girls,” of Louisiana, where a group of “virtuous, modest, well-carriaged young maids” each had a casket or box of clothing supplied to her as part of her payment for emigration. I wish we had these lists, not that I should deem them of great value or accuracy in one respect since they would have been made out naturally by men, but because I should like to read the struggles of the average shipping-clerk or supercargo, or even shipping-master or company’s president, over the items of women’s dress. One reason why the lists we have in the court records are so wildly spelled and often vague is, I am sure, because the recording-clerks were always men. Such hopeless puzzles as droll or drowlas, cale or caul or kail, chatto or shadow, shabbaroon or chaperone, have come to us through these poor struggling gentlemen. There are not to my knowledge any portraits in existence of the wives of the first Dutch settlers of New Netherland. They would have been dressed, I am sure, in the full dress of Holland vrouws. We can turn to the court records of New Netherland to learn the exact item of the dress of the settlers. Let me give in full this inventory of an exceptionally rich and varied wardrobe of Madam Jacob de Lange of New Amsterdam, 1662:—