“When you go and visit a person, never enter abruptly, nor take any one by surprise, but announce your coming by coughing.

“At table, a lady should not speak nor laugh too much, and should always turn the biggest and the best pieces to her guests, and not choose them for herself.

“Every time a lady has drank wine she should wipe her mouth with the table-cloth, but not her eyes or her nose, and she should take care not to soil and grease her fingers in eating, more than she can possibly help.”  The reader must remember that forks were not used until the reign of Henry III.  The author also cautions the ladies to be very careful not to drink to excess, observing that a lady loses talent, wit, beauty, and every charm, when she is elevated with wine; they are also recommended not to swear.

He continues:  “Ladies should not veil their faces before nobles; they may do so when they are on horseback or when they go to church, but on entering they should show their countenances, and particularly before people of quality.

“Ladies should never receive presents from gentlemen of jewels or other things, except from a well intentioned near relation, otherwise it is very blameable.

“It is not becoming for ladies to wrestle with men, and they are also cautioned not to lie or to steal.”  Then follow certain instructions for ladies as to the answers they should make and the manner they should conduct themselves when they receive a declaration.  I hope English ladies will be much edified by the above instructions.  The cries of Paris at this period were constant and absolutely stunning; Guillaume de la Villeneuve observes that the criers were braying in the streets of Paris from morning to night.  Amongst the vegetables, garlick was the most prevalent, which was then eaten with almost every thing, people being in the habit of rubbing their bread with it:  the flour of peas and beans made into a thick paste was sold all hot; onions, chervil, turnips, aniseed, leeks, etc., a variety of pears and apples of sorts that are now scarcely known, except Calville, services, medlers, hips and other small fruits now no longer heard of; nuts, chesnuts of Lombardy, Malta grapes, etc.; for beverage, wine at about a farthing a quart; mustard vinegar, verjuice, and walnut oil; pastry, fresh and salted meat, eggs and honey.  Others went about offering their services to mend your clothes, some to repair your tubs, or polish your pewter; candles, cotton for lamps, foreign soup, and almost every article that can be imagined was sold in the streets, sometimes the price demanded was a bit of bread.  The millers also went bawling about to know if you had any corn to grind, and amongst those that demanded alms were the scholars, the monks, the nuns, the prisoners and the blind.