212 LIBERTY AND A LIVING. 



try and expansion ; for clothes are but our out- 

 most cuticle and mortal coil. Otherwise we 

 shall be found sailing under false colors, and be 

 inevitably cashiered at last by our own opinion 

 as well as that of mankind. 



" When I ask for a garment of a particular 

 form, my tailoress tells me gravely : ' They do 

 not make them so now,' not emphasizing the 

 ' They ' at all, as if she quoted an authority as 

 impersonal as the Fates, and I find it difficult 

 to get made what I want, simply because she 

 cannot believe that I mean what I say that I 

 am so rash. When I hear this oracular sen- 

 tence, I am for a moment absorbed in thought, 

 emphasizing to myself each word separately 

 that I may come at the meaning of it, that 

 I may find out by what degree of consanguinity 

 ' They ' are related to me, and what authority 

 they may have in an affair which affects me so 

 nearly ; and, finally, I am inclined to answer 

 her with equal mystery, and without any more 

 emphasis on the ' They/ It is true they did 

 not make them so recently, but they do so 

 now. We worship not the Graces, nor the 

 Parcae, but Fashion. She spins and weaves 

 and cuts with full authority. The head mon- 

 key at Paris puts on a traveller's cap, and all 

 the monkeys in America do the same. I some- 

 times despair of getting any thing quite simple 

 and honest done in this world by the help of 

 men. They would have to be passed through 



