It is often a very well-dressed body; and in this House of Commons, in particular, there is a very large proportion of well-tailored and well-groomed young men--especially, of course, on the Tory side.

The consequence is, that you are able to trace the transformations of fashion, the processions of the seasons, the variety of appropriate garbs which social and other engagements impose, as accurately in the House of Commons as in Rotten Row.
[Sidenote: The old order.] The ordinary tendency of the Parliamentary man is towards the sombre black, and the solemnity of the long-tailed frock-coat.

There have been times when if a member of Parliament did venture to enter the House of Commons in a coat prematurely ending in the short tails of the morning coat, or in the tail-less sack-coat, he would have been called up to the Speaker's chair and as severely reprimanded as though he had committed the most atrocious offence--in those far-off days--of wearing a pot-hat.
But in these democratic times one can do anything; and low-crowned hats, sack-coats, homespun Irish tweeds, affright and shock the old aristocratic Parliamentary eye.

When summer approaches, the whole aspect of the House changes.

The sombre black is almost entirely doffed; and you look on an assembly as different in its outward appearance from its antecedent state as the yellow-winged butterfly is from the grim grub.
Indeed, members of Parliament seem to take a delight in anticipating the change of dress which the change of season imposes.