stone roads exceeded six thousand pounds, the value of the old pavement broken up being nearly seven thousand pounds.

This improvement of roads has not, however, been confined to England, but has spread over the Continent; and between Petersburg and Moscow there is now as good a road as that to Brighton.

DRESS.

THE laborious and patient investigations of antiquarian writers will render him who follows their track almost as familiar with the dress worn by his ancestors many centuries since, as the newspaper of to-day will enlighten him upon the fashions of the present month. The rude costumes of past ages are as minutely described by old writers as is the finished elegance of dress in our times by any contemporary arbiter of taste; and, whether we turn to the ancient Britons in their woods and caves and painted skins, and the various characteristics of savage life, or to their more polished successors in luxurious civilization, we derive equal gratification.

The skins of animals were, doubtless, the earliest habits of the inland Britons. The man was attired in the skin of the brindled or spotted cow, called in his native tongue Brych, and by the Irish Breach. Instead of this, some of the Britons wore the Isgyn, which was the name for the skin of any wild beast, but more particularly the bear, (formerly an inhabitant of

Britain,) while others assumed the mantell, or sheepskin cloak, according as they were herdsmen, hunters, or shepherds. In later times, the mantell, from being shorter, was worn only on horseback. Such was the dress of the males. The primitive British female passed her time in basket weaving, or in sewing together with leathern thongs or vegetable fibres, the skins of such animals as had fallen into her husband's power, employing, for this purpose, needles made of bone, exactly similar to those used for the heads of arrows. Yet fashion had its sway even in these antique days; for the female was clad in preference, in the skins of the brindled ox, (if they were to be procured,) fastened together with thorns, ornamented with a necklace formed of jet, or other beads, and with wild flowers entwined within her long and flowing locks. It would savour of romantic error to assert that our ancestors were happy amidst contrivances of such extreme simplicity; although

old custom made this life more sweet Than that of painted pomp.

It is believed, however, that the natives of South Britain had the arts of dressing, spinning, and weaving, both wool and flax, from the Gauls, long before the arrival of the Romans. The Phoenicians, trading to Cornwall for tin, are supposed to have communicated the above arts to the Cornish, and the inhabitants of the Scilly Isles; for the latter wore a long black tunic, reaching down to the ancles, with a girdle about

the waist, and their beards long, and hanging down like wings at each corner of the mouth.

Before the Romans entered Britain, the habits of its chiefs consisted of a close coat, or covering for the body, and which, under the denomination of cota, (whence coat,) formed part of the Irish dress. This has also been called a tunic, and was chequered with various colours. It was open before, like a shirt, in order to enable the wearer to put it on, and had sleeves, which were close, yet long; and, reaching to the wrist, it extended itself to the middle. Below this began the pantaloons, which wrapped closely round the thighs and legs, and terminated at the ancles. These were also plaided, and called by the Irish, brigis, and by the Romans braccæ, whence the word breeches. Over the close

fitting coat was thrown the mantle or cloak. On the feet were shoes, made of raw cowhide, with the hair turned outwards, and coming up to the ancles, or the modern buskin, whence our boot. The head was covered with a cap with a projecting poke over the forehead, to protect the eyes; which, in process of time, was disused by the men, and worn only by the women. The men next adopted the hatyr, ata, or hat, of which many with convex crowns appear on early British coins. This kind of dress was worn, however, only by the chieftains of the British Isles, and ladies of rank. Their dependants were still clothed in skins or leather.

The representation of a Romanized Briton was found on a stone dug up at Ludgate, in the

year 1689, and is now preserved in the British Museum. He has a sleeved tunic down to the knees, and over it a plaid; the feet and head are bare; and in one hand he holds the two-handed sword. The Roman British females, on coins of Britannia, appear in sleeved tunics, one or more drawn in below the breasts, with or without a mantle or cloak thrown over the shoulders: "In short," says Fosbroke, 66 they resemble modern women, either in what is called a round gown, or bedgown and petticoat, though the latter, as distinct from a body and sleeves, is not considered to be ancient. This costume of the bedgown and tunic is still worn by the Welsh peasantry." Other accounts state that the British females, as well as the men, were ornamented with golden chains, rings, and bracelets; that they let their hair hang loose upon their shoulders, and being turned back, it fell down without either tying or braiding; and that they endeavoured to make it yellow by art, or, if it were so, to increase its colour. In the description of Boadicea, given by Dion Cassius, (50 B. C.) her hair is stated to have been of a deep yellow, flowing down to the middle of her back; and she is said to have had a golden chain about her neck, and to have been clothed in a tunic of various colours, with a robe over it of a coarse substance, bound round by a girdle fastened with buckles.

The northern parts of Britain were unknown to the Romans long after their invasion; and

S

when Julius Agricola first discovered them, about A. D. 80, they appear to have been almost in a state of barbarism. Even, however, so late as the expedition of the emperor Severus, in A. D. 207, they are believed to have been still naked; their necks and waists were rudely decorated with large rings or chains of iron, and their bodies marked with those various figures, and those stains of woad or blue, which are probably better known and remembered than any other characteristics of the ancient Britons. Their being without garments, however, is conjectured to have arisen rather from pride in the figures delineated upon their bodies, than from any want of the materials or ignorance of dress.

Of these ornamental punctures or tattooing, it may be observed, some resemblance is certainly to be found in the tattooing common among the South Sea Islanders; and it is curious to reflect, that whilst the tattooed head of a New Zealand chief was regarded as a wonder when exhibited in London, not many years since, few admirers of its ingenuity were aware that such had been the aboriginal decoration of their own countrymen many centuries previously. In Britain, they were esteemed the bravest men who best supported the operation of tattooing, received the deepest punctures, and had the greatest number of figures, with the finest display of paint, upon their bodies. It has been supposed that these decorations first gave name to the piratical nation of