I have tried to follow this - but might have missed it - someone surely has pointed out that pale skinned men out on nefarious and illegal business darken their hands and faces so as to be better able to hide, when out poaching, for instance.

Masks are all very well but are likely to be pulled askew and act more as a blindfold, or be pulled off and lost completely when moving through woodland or hedges.

After being in prison it was not unusual for men to darken their skin with 'walnut juice' - I didn't get the recipe - in order to be less conspicuous. Granted the story my grandad told, about someone falling asleep during the process, not washing the lotion off and 'ending up looking like a nignog' doesn't help the argument, but grandad was always going to say that about anyone with a tan, even if it was his neighbour who'd had two weeks in Scarborough, or me going off to polytechnic after a long hot summer.   

Those wishing to cock a snook at authority often wear pheasant feathers in their hats, just out of bravado.

Sounds like border morris to me.

In Restoration England ladies wore black lacquered masks called visages, to protect their complexions when travelling, and their faces from uncooth stares, and to render themselves unrecognisable in the plots of comic plays. I wonder if those who perform Restoration Theatre are accused of racial naughtiness and told to change the masks to other colours for fear of offending.

Anne Croucher   

Anne Croucher