Linsey-woolsy Million (The)

The great unwashed. The artisan class, supposed to dress in linsey-woolsy. “Broadcloth” being for the gentry.

“Truth needs not, John, the eloquence of oaths;

Not more than a decent suit of clothes

Requires of broad gold lace thʹ expensive glare,

That makes the linsey-woolsy million stare.”

Peter Pindar: Silvanus Urban.

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Entry taken from Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, edited by the Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D. and revised in 1895.