The XVIIIth century; its institutions, customs, and costumes France, 1700-1789 . other. Bywhich he intended to signify that the new mode was to wear head-dresses which laid quite flat upon the hair. It was Mme. de Maintenon who introduced the use of falbalas(flounces), and even their abuse, for these flounces, plaited andslashed and puffed, which were so freely used for the petticoats andsleeves, made the dress look very heavy, concealing the good pointsas well as the defects of the wearers figure. Regnard, in hiscomedy already referred to, is as severe upon the falbalas as upon DRESS AND FASH
The XVIIIth century; its institutions, customs, and costumes France, 1700-1789 . other. Bywhich he intended to signify that the new mode was to wear head-dresses which laid quite flat upon the hair. It was Mme. de Maintenon who introduced the use of falbalas(flounces), and even their abuse, for these flounces, plaited andslashed and puffed, which were so freely used for the petticoats andsleeves, made the dress look very heavy, concealing the good pointsas well as the defects of the wearers figure. Regnard, in hiscomedy already referred to, is as severe upon the falbalas as upon DRESS AND FASHIONS. 457 the fontanges, for he makes a valet in this piece say : The Parisianladies only invent fashions with a view of concealing their falbala corrects the imperfections of the waist and lower limbs,while the sqidnqucrqiie (cravat) has been invented for ladies who havegot a long neck and sunken throat. But the falbalas lasted longerthan the fontanges, which, left off at Versailles in 1699, did notentirely disappear in Paris till after the Regency. The falbalas. 290.—A lady in the costume of Louis the Fourteenths time, and wearing a * fontange, getting into her sedan-chair : fac-simile, after a contemporary drawing. were never given up, and the use of them was frequently carried tosuch an excess that a caricaturist of the Regency drew a sketch of alady so enveloped in them that she looked like a turkey shaking itsfeathers and spreading out its comb. This caricature gave rise toa popular song called La dinde aux falbalas, but, in despite of bothsong and caricature, the falbala retained its popularity. In many cases, the sudden discontinuance of a fashion was dueto the most trifling circumstances; sometimes the Court set theexample, and sometimes the town. Thus dresses looped up in frontwith knots of ribbon like window curtains, so as to show a richpetticoat made of some different material and trimmed with circularbands laid one above the other, were still worn at
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