We shall see the fashions of the two past reigns hopelessly garbled, cobbled, and stitched together; a sleeve from one, a skirt from another. Men-at-arms in short tunics of leather and quilted waistcoats to wear under their half-armour; beggars in fashions dating from the eleventh century; a great mass of people in undistinguishable attire, looking mostly like voluminous cloaks on spindle legs, or mere bundles of drapery; here and there a sober gentleman in a houppelande of the simplest kind, with wide skirts reaching to his feet, and the belt with the long tongue about his middle.