The Cuddly Christmas Eve: The Greatest Animal Tales for the Little Ones. Beatrix Potter

      In the time of swords and periwigs and full-skirted coats with flowered lappets – when gentlemen wore ruffles, and goldlaced waistcoats of paduasoy and taffeta – there lived a tailor in Gloucester.

      He sat in the window of a little shop in Westgate Street, cross-legged on a table, from morning till dark.

      All day long while the light lasted he sewed and snippeted, piecing out his satin and pompadour, and lute-string; stuffs had strange names, and were very expensive in the days of the Tailor of Gloucester.

      But although he sewed fine silk for his neighbours, he himself was very, very poor – a little old man in spectacles, with a pinched face, old crooked fingers, and a suit of threadbare clothes.