Figure 1.--This unidentified English boy with his big sister wers a blouse and embridered skirt. with what look like trousers rather than pantalettes. Panbtalettes were usually, but not always, white and made in a light-weight material. .

While it wasless common than pantlettes, we see some boys wearing pants/trousers wih kilts and skirts. we do not see this with dresses, perhps because dresses usully meant younger boys. We stress the term trousers here so as not to confuse our Briutush readees. (Pants in British English meant underpants.) And here we are talking about proper trousers. We are not sure how to explain this phenomnon. It was kind of a half measure toward breeching. We suspct tht it was mothers that were resisging breechingtheir young sons, thus delaying breeching a year or so. It does not seem he kind of a thing that fther would do. We see this with skirts, kilts and tunics. This was not the standard procedure, but there are enough examples in the photographic record to know that it was not rare. Clearly in some families, a gret deal og thought went into breeching.

Created: 6:18 AM 8/26/2022
Last updated: 6:18 AM 8/26/2022