Page:Costume, fanciful, historical, and theatrical (1906).djvu/237

CHAP. XVI costume. It owed its first entry into le monde oú l'on s' amuse to those Venetian orgies and wild midnight revels encouraged by the Council of Ten as a means whereby the attention and energies of the youth of the capital of the Adriatic might be diverted from politics.

When the gay world made the domino its own, fashion decreed that it should retain its original shape, and this it has continued to do down to the present. The same conservatism did not extend to colour. As a matter of fact it has, at one time and another, appeared in all shades, and in every appropriate variety of texture, lined or unlined; in two or more tones, self-coloured, trimmed, or plain, sumptuous or severe, according to the tastes and inclination of the wearer. A man's domino, as typical of to-day as of five hundred years ago, consists of a long, ample robe of scarlet cashmere gathered into a plain yoke piped with satin. Three small cashmere buttons fasten it snugly from the throat downwards, and satin ribbon ties it across the chest. The peaked hood is lined with satin and weighted with a heavy silk tassel, and over the shoulders falls a short, pleated cape. Of the "angel" order, the wide, pointed sleeves are turned back to allow a narrow glimpse of satin, the fold held in place by a cord loop and a diminutive gold button sewn to the under arm seam immediately above the wrist. That the religious origin of the domino was never lost sight of is illustrated by the anecdote of the dissipated young reveller who, leaving a masked ball in the grey dawn, was met by an indignant father, who proceeded to load him with reproaches on the subject of his dissolute mode of life. After