They had discarded also, all ornaments, such as of lace, or bunches of ribbands at the knees, and their buttons were generally of alchymy, as this composition was then termed, or of the same colour as their clothes.
The grave and religious women also, like the men, had avoided the fashions of their times.

These had adopted the cap, and the black hood for their headdress.

The black hood had been long the distinguishing mark of a grave matron.

All prostitutes, so early as Edward the third, had been forbidden to wear it.

In after-times it was celebrated by the epithet of venerable by the poets, and had been introduced by painters as the representative of virtue.