Note 173 — III

The earliest example which Richardson gives of ‘seamstress’ is from Gay, of ‘songstress’, from Thomson. I find however ‘sempstress’ in the translation of Olearius’ Voyages and Travels, 1669, p. 43. It is quite certain that as late as Ben Jonson, ‘seamster’ and ‘songster’ expressed the female seamer and singer; a single passage from his Masque of Christmas is evidence to this. One of the children of Christmas there is “Wassel, like a neat sempster and songster; her page bearing a brown bowl”. Compare a passage from Holland’s Leaguer, 1632: “A tyre-woman of phantastical ornaments, a sempster for ruffes, cuffes, smocks and waistcoats”.