Spring Styles in Armour.

Te Aroha News, Volume IV, Issue 161, 17 July 1886, Page 4

Spring Styles in Armour.

Tut; growing demand for arcaour for home decotation has induced a " Sifting^'reporter to invosiigate the spring styles that are offered, with the following results : Bveatpleates will be worn a trifle lower this Reason than last, with either a single or double row of steel rivets as the wearer prefera. Those with long-pad attachments are recommended for the weak-chested. Shirts of mail are now made of barbed fence wire, and open in the b/>ck as heretofore. _ The spring style is fitted with a standing collar, encircled by a cravat of narrow band ribbon. Helmets have undergone some change They are still lined with hoop iron, but the helmet with ear muffr, co popular last winter, has given place to one that has a ventilator on top that will be appreciated when warm weather arrives. Visors with incipient moustaches have neen introduced by certain young dudea, but thero is no great demand for thorn. In olden times knights often wore their visors down, but there is no record of their ever having worn down on their visore. Boiler plate is still the favourite material for i eck-guarris, ac it doesn't"wrinklH. In New York a shrewd criminal lawyer i* considered the best neck guard, but this is altogether a matter of taste. Corfelets for the afternoon promenade are cut. Prince Albert style, though fashion of course lets a man wear a cutaway if he prefers it. Many tailors, however, will not let you wear a cutaway until you have paid for it. The latest edict of fashion prescribes that gauntlets shall be made of Bessemer steel, and reach above the elbow. Greves for the legs are now made of pheet iron, which prevents bagging at the knee. The corrugated stove pipe elbows for arm coverings, seen in the mediaeval iaehion plates, still retain their popularity. Thighpieces hove discarded pocket holes on the side. While a knight of old found a pockefc hole convenient to stow away his tobacco and jack knite, it presented a vulnerable point to the enemy. In the battles of the Crusades the number of knights wounded in the pocket was appalling. Many of them were left without a cent.

Old Judge Saunders is a great brag anc has told 'about a dozen different stories it regard to the weight of a certain catfish that he caught. A friend, trying to entnif him, asked : " Judge, what was the precis* weight of that big fish you caught V Judge Saunders (to coloured waiter) : " ] say Bob, what did I say yesterday thai catfish weighed ?" " What time yesterday, boss — in de mawning, at dinner-time, 01 after supper ?"