all that she had ever worn in her lifetime, since it is not upon record that she ever gave any thing away.

Anciently there was no covering for the head, except the mitre for the priests and princes. The Eastern nations were fond of displaying the hair; the Roman ladies made a practice of dying it yellow or red. The modern hat was not worn till the fifteenth century; before that time they used woollen caps, when the weather required any protection for the head.

The covering for the feet needs to be more particularly mentioned. Sandals were most common among the orientals. As they were mere soles of wood or leather fastened to the foot with strings, they were no protection from the dust; hence arose the hospitable practice of washing the visiter's feet; a practice so much insisted upon by public opinion, that if any one passing out of a house beat the dust from his feet, it showed that they had not been washed, and left on the house the reproach of inhospitality, which was the deepest of all dishonor.

6

The Greeks and Romans added the moccason or buskin to the sandal; the former was worn by tragic actors. The shoe makes quite a figure in English history. In the time of Richard I., says Stow, began the detestable use of piked shooes, the toes being tied up to the knee with chains of silver or guilt.' Edward IV., says the same historian, ordained that no man weare shooes or boots having toes passing two inches long; no peakes of boots or shooes to pass that length on pain of cursing by the clergie.'

The art of knitting was unknown to the ancients; that of netting they understood. This has occasioned some slight perplexity to scholars, who are not supposed to know the difference between the two operations. Knitting is tolerably well known. We have looked into Johnson's folio to ascertain what net-work is; he defines it as any thing reticulated or decussated at equal distances, with interstices between the intersections.' If this does not explain it, we know not what will. Those of our readers, if any there be, who have no stockings, may be comforted by the assurance, that all the great men of antiquity were, so far as this privation goes, equally unhappy.

The stocking-loom was invented by William Lee, an Englishman, in the year 1589. Several romantic stories are told of the first suggestion of this invention; that, for example, it

owed its existence to a passion for a girl, who paid more attention to her knitting than to him, which induced him to turn his attention in the same direction. The French have claimed the invention, probably, because Lee, finding no favor in England, went over to Paris, and was patronized by Henry IV., but being neglected after the murder of that King, he died in distress at that city.

It is well known that silk, which is now so generally employed in the manufacture of stockings, was introduced into the Roman empire by Justinian. But some are perplexed by the mention made of silk in Scripture, in the history of Alexander the Great, and in the Georgics of Virgil. The kind of moth, whose winding-sheet is so much employed by the human race at present, has supplanted various kinds that were known before, such as lived on the oak, pine, and ash; and another, which was called the silk-worm of the sea, the silk being the delicate cordage with which the mother-ofpearl lashes itself to the rock. The Chinese, or mulberry silk-worm, has taken place of the rest-except in Ceos in the Archipelago. Chateaubriand mentions, that in visiting that island he called on the Bishop, whom he found engaged in spinning; the prelate, who was a decided utilitarian, sharply reproved the traveller, telling him that he might improve his time better than in searching for bits of old marble.

As soon as stockings were invented, they began to make them of silk. Howell says, 'that great and expensive prince, Henry VIII. wore ordinarily cloth hose, except when there came from Spain, by great chance, a pair of silk stockings. King Edward, his son, was presented with a pair of long Spanish silk stockings by Thomas Gresham, his merchant, and the present was much taken notice of.' Stow says, that in the third year of Elizabeth, Mistress Montague having presented the queen with a pair of silk stockings, she was so delighted with them, that she never would weare cloth hose after.' How valuable such a possession was in that day, appears from a letter of James I., written while he was king of Scotland. It was addressed to the Earl of Mar, telling that nobleman, that the Spanish Ambassador was to be presented at court, and begging the loan of his stockings for the occasion. It contains this touching appeal; 'Ye would na sure that your king should appear as a scrub before strangers.'

There are interesting questions connected with this subject;

why, for example, are the arts of life so humble and mechanical, while the arts of death are so imposing and high. But we have not room to discuss them. We hope that these inventions will continue to multiply, and are content to esteem as a benefactor to mankind, every one who adds to their number. It is true, they are things that pass away; this is because one improvement follows and supplants another; it is like the teeth of childhood; the new push out the old, and are ready to take their places when they fall.

ART. IV.-Pennsylvanian Biography.

Memoirs of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania. Part II. Philadelphia. 1830.

We have always attached great importance to the systematic study, as a part of education, of the personal narrative of the Revolution. No nation the world has ever known can make a more substantial boast, as respects the character of its founders, than we can, and classical antiquity has no more romantic picture than our free infancy presents. Pride in such an ancestry is an elevated and honorable sentiment, which we would fondly cherish, as calculated to fill a void which may be less beneficially supplied. Ad illa, pro se quisque acriter intendat animum, quæ vita, qui mores fuerint; per quos viros, quibus artibus domi militiæque partum et auctum imperium sit.' It is surely not extravagant to say, that the man, who thoroughly imbibes the spirit of romantic devotion which actuated our revolutionary progenitors, will scorn the humbler associations of ephemeral politics, and, in aiming at an imitation of the virtues of our heroic age, will rise to a level suited to such an emulation. Let any one study with attention the biographies of such men as James Otis and Josiah Quincy, and watch the developement of patriotic ardor, which, when once it burst into a flame, defied control, the fearlessness that shrunk from no danger and despised all compromise, the willing immolation of every selfish feeling, and the romantic consecration of every faculty to what seemed to be the engrossing purpose of their being, and he will hardly view with much respect the feats and honors of a modern politician. We have referred to these two instances, on account of their marked peculiarity, and beVOL. XXXIII.-NO. 72.

14

cause they are among the few, which the care of posterity has illustrated. The principles on which they acted were those which guided every patriot of the times. There seemed to be a holy atmosphere that enveloped the soil of freedom, and excrted its genial influence on all who breathed it. It is painful to confess, that less pure breezes have occasionally tainted this consecrated element, and to observe the difference which, in point of moral and poetic beauty, may be discerned in the career of the same individual. We shall not easily forget the unpleasant effect produced by the contrast of the revolutionary with the post-revolutionary memoirs of Mr. Jefferson, his autobiography with his 'Ana.' In the first, we trace the operation of pure and patriotic sympathies, and affections too active and powerful to permit the intrusion of personal antipathy, or suspicion of any feeling unworthy of the great cause he was so anxiously promoting; in the last, it is impossible to be blind to the influence of party association on a vigorous and honorable mind, in fostering unkind resentments, and perpetuating hostility of the severest description. And yet, of all the eulogies which the natural enthusiasm of the day has bestowed on that great man, how few, in comparison, are founded on the enduring basis of his revolutionary services.

It is matter of sincere regret, that as a study and a part of at least accomplished education, the history and biography of the Revolution have been so grossly neglected. We do not hazard much in saying, that there is no given portion of modern history, with the details of which the great body of our fellow-citizens are less familiar, than that which records the actions of our immediate ancestry; and that there are many, very many Americans, young and old, who, while they would smile in scorn, if asked what ship-money' or 'lettres de cachet' were, would pause in ignorance if catechised as to the objects of the Quebec bill' or the 'writs of assistance.' Hampden, and Russell, and Sidney, are names familiar to many, to whom the personal services of our own patriots are unknown. To produce a different result is the legitimate object of American literature, and it is with sincere pleasure that we hail any attempt, however humble, to rescue from the dark oblivion in which they have too long reposed, the records of our early fame. We would make it popular by all the fascinations of eloquence and all the mechanical embellishments of art. We would have a Family Library,' truly

national, and instead of tainting the minds of our children by access to the records of justified or palliated crime, in the biographies of profligate heroes and licentious monarchs,* we would chasten them by the habitual exhibition of virtues of domestic growth, and actions of appropriate interest. Independently of the ulterior consequence of contributing to the capital stock on which the future historian of our country will have to operate, the revolutionary biographer may be stimulated by the reasonable hope of giving a new and salutary direction to the public taste; and, putting out of view the practical and substantial benefits to which we have incidentally referred, he will find, that the personal narratives of our early history are replete with incident worthy of illustration from authors as able and accomplished as any that our country has yet produced.

Our attention has been recently directed anew to the materials for supplying the void to which we have alluded, by the publication of the volume whose title we have prefixed to this article. Though it is in itself meagre in point of novel information, the source from which it emanates entitles it to some notice at our hands, particularly as it professes, in part, to illustrate portions of our early history, which have hitherto been in great measure neglected. We refer, especially, to the revolutionary annals of what, at the commencement of the contest, was the metropolis of our country. It is matter of painful astonishment, that, with the abundance of materials and the acknowledged existence of the requisite ability, no biography of a Pennsylvanian patriot has yet appeared. The descendants of the great men whom that portion of the Union produced, owe a vast debt to their country, which we hope will before long be cancelled; and if such a result shall be at all promoted by the cursory remarks we have made, every object we have in view will be fully attained. There is a peculiar interest connected with this subject, which deserves a more specific reference, than our limits will now permit us to make. All that we hope to do, is to point to the soil beneath which the treasures are hidden. Boston and Philadelphia, at the commencement of the contest, were the two points at which the flame of active patriotism seemed to burn brightest. The density of city population

*No. VI. Harper's Family Library, Southey's Life of Nelson; No. XV. Croly's Life and Times of George IV.