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| Darcy and Georgiana visit Lizzy. |
Morning visits were a very important part of a Regency lady or Austen heroine's day. After breakfast ladies went shopping or made ‘morning’ visits until dinner, which could be late in the afternoon.If the family you were visiting were out (or ‘denied’
by the servant), you left a visiting card. In Sense & Sensibility,
when Elinor and Marianne stayed in town with Mrs Jennings, they knew that
Edward Ferrars had arrived in London because: ‘Twice was his card found on the
table, when they returned from their morning engagements’. Morning visitors
were received in the drawing room and offered refreshments. In Pride & Prejudice, when Elizabeth
Bennet and her aunt paid a morning call to Miss Darcy at Pemberley, they were
treated to ‘cold meat, cake, and a variety of all the finest fruits in season’.
Ladies wore ‘half-dress’ or ‘morning’ dress for paying morning
visits and going shopping. Morning or ‘walking’ dresses (circa 1800) usually had long
sleeves. Men like Beau Brummell usually
wore a beautifully-cut blue morning coat with brass buttons, a light-coloured
waistcoat, buckskins, a crisply starched cravat, and top-boots. Ackermann’s Repository for April 1809
reported that ‘dark blue, olive, and bottle green’ coats with ‘silver and gilt
basket buttons’ were fashionable for dress and morning coats. On the morning of
her marriage to George Wickham, flighty Lydia Bennet (Pride & Prejudice) ‘longed to know whether he would be married
in his blue coat’.
Illustrations:
Mr Darcy and his sister Georgiana pay a morning visit to Elizabeth
Bennet in Pride and Prejudice. C.E.Brock illustration courtesy of the wonderful
Molland’s website.
Morning dress, Lady’s Monthly Museum fashion plate, December
1798. Author’s collection.
Full dress and walking dress, Lady’s Monthly Museum fashion plate,
January 1805. Author’s collection.
