Figure 1.--This CDV portrait is undated, but would have been taken in the 1860s. We see a mother with her voluminous dress and her son werearing a tunic suit. The boy wear pants with his tunic that are shirt cut long pants, but obly nslightly above the ankels. Boys wore long pants in the first half of the 19th century. At mid-century we begin to see shorter-cut pants. The studio L. Caudevelle in Boulogne-S-Mer.

The tunic suit also included a matching pair of pants. The styling in a tunic suit was primarily on the tunic itself. French boys wore their tunic suits with both bloomer knickers and straight-leg knee pants. The straght-leg knee pants seem especially common, but we are yet sure which was more common. The knickers were often, but not always, worn above the knees. There werealso long pants, mostly in theeary-19th century. Tunic suits with short pants appear to have been less common, primarily because short pants began to become popular tunics were going out of style . And of course there ppear to have been chronological differences, but our limited archive makes this difficult to assess at this time. As a result, we are vnot sure if the chronological differences in these styles or if knickers or short pants were considered more appropriate for different age boys. Our initual assessment is thatvage grading was ot an imprtant factor in terms of the pants worn wih tunics. We hink that the primary fctor was the generalmpopularity of the different ypes of pants that French boys wore over time. In the early- and mid-19th century, boys mostly wore long pants. Here we do not have much photographic ecidence. Photography was only invednted in 1839. There are drawings and poaintings. Often this meant long poants done in white or other colors and material that did not mobth the tunic. Gradually after mid-century we see boys wearing shortened length pants, both knee pants and bloomer knickers. And these shoirtened-lenth paants usually did match the tunic.