DRESS OF A SHOOTER. 121 



florentine, which is printed on each side, in imitation 

 of cloth. This stuff far surpasses the others for light- 

 ness, comfort, durability, and every thing that can be 

 required for warm weather; but, as there is no par- 

 ticular interest in making it (rather the reverse), it is 

 not every where very easily procured; so that your 

 tailor would probably be obliged to order it, in doing 

 which he cannot choose it of too good a quality. 



With regard to the other part of the dress, but few 

 persons appear to know what is really comfortable, and 

 I may, therefore, appear singular for considering as 

 most uncomfortable, that which is commonly, and was 

 till of late years, universally worn : I mean shoes and 

 gaiters. To say nothing of being tormented with two 

 or three dozen of buttons eveiy morning, and having 

 your ankles and knees in a state of confinement through 

 a hard day's exercise, it need only be observed, that, if 

 you step in the least puddle, you are wet ; if you tread 

 in moist ground, your shoe is pulled down at heel ; and 

 you are often liable to be annoyed by your shoes unty- 

 ing, and thorns and bits of stick, &c., getting into them, 

 or between the buttons of your gaiters. How much 

 more comfortable, then, is the dress here recommended ! 

 With lambswool stockings and flannel drawers, put on 

 a pair of overall-boots, and then draw over them a pair 

 of trousers, which may be made either of fustian or 

 leather, and so strongly defended inside the knees, that 

 no thorn can penetrate. Thus you are equipped without 

 trouble or loss of time ; you have your muscles per- 

 fectly at liberty for hard exercise, and are free from 

 every annoyance ; not to say a word on the advantage 

 and safety you have in the stirrup, if on horseback, or 

 on the infallibility of this remedy against the annoyance 



