smiling at their vanity, particularly that of my wife, from whom
I expected more discretion. In this exigence, therefore, my only
resource was to order my son, with an important air, to call our
coach. The girls were amazed at the command; but I repeated it
with more solemnity than before.--'Surely, my dear, you jest,'
cried my wife, 'we can walk it perfectly well: we want no coach
to carry us now.' 'You mistake, child,' returned I, 'we do want a
coach; for if we walk to church in this trim, the very children
in the parish will hoot after us.'--'Indeed,' replied my wife, 'I
always imagined that my Charles was fond of seeing his children
neat and handsome about him.'--'You may be as neat as you
please,' interrupted I, 'and I shall love you the better for it,
but all this is not neatness, but frippery. These rufflings, and
pinkings, and patchings, will only make us hated by all the wives
of all our neighbours. No, my children,' continued I, more
gravely, 'those gowns may be altered into something of a plainer
cut; for finery is very unbecoming in us, who want the means of
decency. I do not know whether such flouncing and shredding is
becoming even in the rich, if we consider, upon a moderate
calculation, that the nakedness of the indigent world may be
cloathed from the trimmings of the vain.'

This remonstrance had the proper effect; they went with great
composure, that very instant, to change their dress; and the next
day I had the satisfaction of finding my daughters, at their own
request employed in cutting up their trains into Sunday
waistcoats for Dick and Bill, the two little ones, and what was
still more satisfactory, the gowns seemed improved by this
curtailing.