raise to the dignity of a passion, was reduced to a science, and made subservient to those great principles of policy in which society began to perceive its only chance of durable good.  Manufactures attained a state of high perfection, and went on progressively with the growth of wealth and luxury.  The opulence of the towns of Brabant and Flanders was without any previous example in the state of Europe.  A merchant of Bruges took upon himself alone the security for the ransom of John the Fearless, taken at the battle of Nicopolis, amounting to two hundred thousand ducats.  A provost of Valenciennes repaired to Paris at one of the great fairs periodically held there, and purchased on his own account every article that was for sale.  At a repast given by one of the counts of Flanders to the Flemish magistrates the seats they occupied were unfurnished with cushions.  Those proud burghers folded their sumptuous cloaks and sat on them.  After the feast they were retiring without retaining these important and costly articles of dress; and on a courtier reminding them of their apparent neglect, the burgomaster of Bruges replied, “We Flemings are not in the habit of carrying away the cushions after dinner!” The meetings of the different towns for the sports of archery were signalized by the most splendid display of dress and decoration.  The archers were habited in silk, damask, and the finest linen, and carried chains of gold of great weight and value.  Luxury was at its height among women.  The queen of Philip the Fair of France, on a visit to Bruges, exclaimed, with astonishment not unmixed with envy, “I thought myself the only queen here; but I see six hundred others who appear more so than I.”

The court of Phillip the Good seemed to carry magnificence and splendor to their greatest possible height.  The dresses of both men and women at this chivalric epoch were of almost incredible expense.  Velvet, satin, gold, and precious stones seemed the ordinary materials for the dress of either sex; while the very housings of the horses sparkled with brilliants and cost immense sums.  This absurd extravagance was carried so far that Charles V. found himself forced at length to proclaim sumptuary laws for its repression.

The style of the banquets given on grand occasions was regulated on a scale of almost puerile splendor.  The Banquet of Vows given at Lille, in the year 1453, and so called from the obligations entered into by some of the nobles to accompany Philip in a new crusade against the infidels, showed a succession of costly fooleries, most amusing in the detail given by an eye-witness (Olivier de la Marche), the minutest of the chroniclers, but unluckily too long to find a place in our pages.