Country Life

Dress in the country.

The first suit of tweeds.

Dress in the country varies considerably in many matters from that worn in town. A boy’s first “country suit” after he leaves school is a great event to him. At Eton and Harrow the style of dress might almost be called a uniform, and the first suit of tweeds marks the emancipation from school - life. When in the country he dons these the first thing in the morning, unless he should be on hunting or bicycling thoughts intent, or should incline towards tennis, boating, or the slow delights of angling. After lunch a change has occasionally to be made.

At a garden party.

Should a garden party be in question, he may take his choice between tweed suit and low hat or cutaway coat with silk hat. If he happen to be great on tennis the tweed suit would be naturally his choice, unless it were distinctly understood that the game would form a prominent feature of the afternoon’s entertainment. In this case flannels would be worn. Sometimes very ceremonious garden parties take place in the country, when Royalty or distinguished persons are expected to be present, when the frock coat and its usual accompaniments would not be out of place.

Invitations to breakfast.

Church-going costume.

Invitations to breakfast in the country are by no means unusual. The dress would consist of that ordinarily worn in the mornings, whether tweed suit, knickerbockers, hunting or riding gear, or the black morning- coat or suit. Frequently a silk hat is never seen between Sunday and Sunday. Churchgoers still, to a certain extent, affect it, but in these days of outdoor life, bicycling, and so on, the costume worn by men in church is experiencing the same modifications that characterise it in other departments. The details of shooting suits can always be studied in the illustrated advertisements of the tailors. A man’s wardrobe is now almost as varied as a woman’s. He has different costumes for walking, riding, driving, visiting, boating, hunting, shooting, golfing, bicycling, tennis, and cricket, dining, smoking, and lounging, football, racing, and yachting, to say nothing of uniform and Court suit, besides the now developing motor-car costume.