No More Learning

=5. 1. 48 A kind of Irish penance! = 'There is the same allusion to
the _rug gowns_ of the wild Irish, in the _Night Walker_ of Fletcher:

We have divided the sexton's household stuff
Among us; one has the _rug_, and he's turn'd _Irish_. '--G.

Cf. also Holinshed, _Chron. _ (quoted _CD. _):'As they distill the best
aqua-vitae, so they spin the choicest _rug_ in Ireland. ' Fynes Moryson
(_Itinerary_, fol. 1617, p. 160) says that the Irish merchants were
forbidden to export their wool, in order that the peasants might
'be nourished by working it into cloth, namely, Rugs . . . & mantles
generally worn by men and women, and exported in great quantity.
'

Jonson mentions rug as an article of apparel several times. In
_Alch. _, _Wks. _ 4. 14, it is spoken of as the dress of a poor man
and _ibid. _ 4. 83 as that of an astrologer. In _Ev. Man out_ (_Wks. _
2. 110) a similar reference is made, and here Gifford explains that
rug was 'the usual dress of mathematicians, astrologers, &c. , when
engaged in their sublime speculations. ' Marston also speaks of rug
gowns as the symbol of a strict life (_What You Will_, _Wks. _ 2. 395):

Lamp-oil, watch-candles, rug-gowns, and small juice,
Thin commons, four o'clock rising,--I renounce you all.

=5.