disguised that, without being in the secret, none could distinguish them. They were carried about in sedan chairs, and once the queen's chairman, not knowing who she was, went from her; so she was alone and much disturbed, and came to Whitehall in a hackney coach (some say it was in a cart)." Scarcely a week passed by but that Whitehall was brilliantly illuminated for a ball, at which the king, queen, and courtiers danced the "bransle," which was a sort of country dance, the "corant," swift and lively as a jig, and in which only two persons took part, and other French figures. Billiards and chess were played a great deal, and gambling was a ruling passion of the day. All the great women at court had their card tables, around which thronged the courtiers, who won and lost enormous sums. The passions which were aroused by gambling often led to violent quarrels, and frequently these were settled by duels, although duelling had been prohibited by the king at the time of the Restoration. Many fantastic changes had taken place in women's attire during the reign of Charles. During the Commonwealth, Puritan sentiment, and proscription as well, had reduced the dress of all classes to a remarkable uniformity. The costume most common to women consisted of a gown with a lace stomacher and starched kerchief, a sad-colored cloak with a French hood, and a high-crowned hat. The Geneva cloak was no fit covering for the courtesan, and was instantly thrown aside that the butterfly which had hidden in this demure chrysalis might emerge fluttering in all its gay and brilliant colors. Loose and flowing draperies of silk and satin took the place of woollen and cotton gowns; the stiff ruff which in the reign of Elizabeth had been facetiously styled "three steps to the gallows," because the fashionables of her day would go to any length to possess it in the most extravagant size and value, had, under the Commonwealth, become much more circumspect as to its appearance and circumference, and was esteemed entirely too respectable to comport well with the freedom of the reign of Charles. Then, too, the artistic taste of the day, which ran to portrait painting, had enhanced the estimate of ladies with regard to the matter of their personal charms. So it was regarded not only as artistic, but æsthetic, in a wider sense, to run to realism. The word "run" is used advisedly, for there was a veritable scramble to get rid of the formal and, it must be conceded, ridiculous ruff. But when the latter disappeared from the neck and shoulders, there was nothing adapted to fulfil its functions, so that, through a lamentable omission on the part of the English women or their too hasty adoption of French fashions, the shoulders and bosoms of the ladies were given little consideration by the designers or the makers of their gowns.