About this time there arose an objectionable class of men, who tried to ape the gentleman, but could not, and they went by the generic term of “Gents.” _Punch_ was death upon them, and I give one of the satirist’s onslaughts, as it reproduces the costumes and amusements of the day. First let us see the “Gent” pictorially, and then, afterwards, read what manner of animal he was.
_For amending the Public Deportment of certain individuals called_ “_Gents_,” _abiding in London and other places_.
WHEREAS it having been represented that there are, at present existing in the Metropolis, as well as in the provincial districts, certain individuals known and spoken of as “Gents,” whose bearing and manners are perfectly at variance with the characters, which, from a monomania, they appear desirous of assuming:
AND WHEREAS, in consequence of cheap clothes, imitative dispositions, and intellectual poverty, this class is greatly on the increase, it has been thought necessary that this Act should be framed to control their vicious habits:
May it, therefore, please your Majesty, that it be enacted: AND BE IT ENACTED henceforth, that all Gents, not actually in the employ of the _Morning Post_, or Mr. Simpson, of the “Albion,” be prevented from wearing white cravats at parties, the same being evidently an attempt of sixth-rate individuals to ape the manners of first-class circles. And that no Gent, who does not actually keep a horse, and is not in the Army, be allowed to strut up and down the Burlington Arcade, with a whip and moustachios, such imposition being exceedingly offensive, and amounting to a passive swindling of the spectators.
AND BE IT ENACTED, that all such things as light-blue stocks, large figured shawls, cheap primrose gloves, white Chesterfield coal sacks, half-guinea Albert boots; in fact, all those articles ticketed in the shop windows as “Gent’s last style,” be considered the distinctive marks of the class, and condemned accordingly. And that every individual, moreover, smoking outside an omnibus, sticking large pins in his cravat, wearing fierce studs in his shirt, walking with others four abreast in Regent Street, reading slang publications, and adopting their language, playing billiards in public rooms, sporting dingy white gloves in the slips of the theatres, frequenting night taverns, and being on terms of familiarity with the singers and waiters, thinking great things of champagne, as if everything at a party depended upon it; and, especially, wearing the hat on one side, be the signs of most unmitigated Gents, and shunned equally with hydrophobia.