If you use mvp's method but add the onblur event to change it back to a text field so the placeholder text appears again when the input field looses focus. It just makes the hack a little bit nicer.
<input placeholder="Date" class="textbox-n" type="text" onfocus="(this.type='date')" onblur="(this.type='text')" id="date" />
_x000D_
Hope this helps.