STARVED BY THE HOBBLE.

Dominion, Volume 5, Issue 1354, 3 February 1912, Page 11

STARVED BY THE HOBBLE.

FREAKS OP FASHION. We wore at tea in the great hall of the hotel (writes John N. Raphael from Paris to tho "Daily Express"). There is no particular need to mention the name of any real hotel in Paris. It was one of those hotels where people do meet now for; tea and gossip in the'.afternoons, and where, whilo listening to tho music, thq women keep a keen look-out for novelties in fashion. The dressmakers of Paris have-found out that "lo fiv' o'elocque" (as Parisians will call tea at 1 p.m.) has trade potentialities, and send their pretty mannequins or living models to the great hotels at tea-time dressed in their very latest novelties. One never 'has the slightest hesitation in recognising tho mannequins. They look so much more aristocratic than the real aristocrats, and they are ever so much prettier, too. Then they always arrive late, and it takes them twenty minutes to find a table,' oven when there are several empty tables begging them to have toa on them. But they stroll up and down, in and about, ana -when thev have decided on their table, they stroll off "to see whether. . ." and thon stroll back again, until the least perspicuous man has made his mind up that this pretty woman is "one of those dressmaker womon, don't you know," and every woman in the hotol has planned ft fresh attack on her husband's banking , account. A tall,' fair, exquisitely pretty girl ("From X's! I should recognise the, cut in a London November fog," whispered Madame la Marquise at the table next to ours enthusiastically) had .made a sensational entry, had with the usual difficulty secured a, table, had "been to see whether . . ." had returned, and had sottlcd down at last amid a hum of admiration which the best-executed item on the musical programme had" failed to secure. Tho mannequin's dress was of wonderful cut. and moulded a beautiful figure. How the tall girl could walk in her, skirt, or her sheath, as she did was a wonder. How she could sit down in it was a greater wonder yet. And all of a sudden a man whom nobody knows, a man who was sitting alone at a tiny table in tho corner, leaned forward and addressed us all. "Mesdames," he said, "ladies, I ask you to pardon so unusual a proceeding. But I wish very much to talk to you, and I have obtained the permission of the hotel management to deliver a little lecture. There will be no appeal for money after it. ,1 am no beggar. lam a traveller who has returned from a town which is starving, and I . am going, if you will allow me, to tell you a little story, and then to ask you, not for money, but for a little pity." He looked round and smiled. Conversation had dropped. Nobody protested at all, for the man looked like a nice man. .He was evidently not an "outsider," and he spoke from. his chair, quietly, and without any effort, yet with ' ~ _J /

an, air of authority which compelled attention. "Mesdames," he said, "thousands of women and children are starving and crying for food in the north because of these narrow dress-skirts you are wearing." There was a sudden buzz of interest all overr the big hall. "Starving?" said somebody. "Yes, madame, dying of hunger. I have just returned from a trip to Roubaix, where much of the material is made for your' dresses. And there is a famine in Roubaix. Food is dear, and there is no money to buy food. Men, women, and children there clamour for work, and there is no work for tho men, women, and children to do. And I tell you this, ladies, because it is not the case in Roubaix only. It is the ca9e 'in many other towns in France, it is the case in many towns in England, where the stuffs are made which make your dresses, it is the case in towns the whole world over whoro dress stuffs .are the staple manufacture. But let me talk to you of Roubaix, for I have just left Roubaix. The mayor of Roubaix went with me t-o the railway station. As ho shook hands with me, just as my train left, he said, did Monsieur lo Maire, 'In. the last twelve months Roubaix has lost' .£BOO,OOO in cash ; because of the prevalent fashion for skimpy skirts.' And Roubaix is a email town in the north of France, mesdames." Every woman in the hall had forgotten her tea. The men were interested, too. This stranger had the .knack of compelling interest. "Ton know," ho gaid, "that in the prehistoric days, a rear ago, when full skirts wero in fashion, . .eight _ or nine yards went to a woman's skirt. Now,. since tho fashion has changed and women ■ try to look as milch as possible liko neatly-folded umbrellas"—several of us laughed, and the tall ' mannequin from the Maison X paid for her tea and glided majestically out— "a skirt needs four.yards only, even less. Oho iice<l not be a minister of finance or a professor of mathematics to calculate from ' this that only half the stuff 1 is needed now that was needed a year ago, and . that just half the number of people need be employed to make it. In Roubaix'aloue thero aro 20,000 men and women out of work and starving because of vour tight skirts, mesdames. _ "These narrow skirts which you insist on wearing, mewlames, not because they aro Tacofnl or pretty, but because fashion bids you wear them, are causing unimaginable misery in many country and in many towns/this winter, tor it not only tlie makers of dress tissues who are suffering. The narrow skirts have done away with-pardon mfr-the use, of petticoats. You need not bo told figures. I could give you statistics, but the plain fact is more than sufficient. There aro 90 per.cent, of the petticoat makers out of work nil tho world over, mesdames. They took (o blouse-making ' at first. The pay was less, but it was something. Now the kimono .blouse has come in. A yard squaro of material instead of two yards as before, a hole

for tho head, two scams at the sides for thi big sloeves, a hom at tho waist, and that's all. Tho blonso makers aro starving as well. Of tho fifteen thousand looms in Itoubaix, mesdames, eight thousand. aro silent now. The 'manufactories are closing down. There is a cry of famine. There will lie rioting before long. Mesdanies, I ask you for nothing except a little pity. Do not send money to Roubaix or elsewhere. Think, now that the Christmas season draws so near, of tho poor women and the children who are starving. Do not bo slaves of fashion. Give fashion your orders. If you all wear full skirts again, full skirts will once again be beautiful." And pardon me, mesdames, for talking seriously when yon would have preferred to listen to the music." Ho paid for his tea and left tho hotel. The band struck up a waltz from "The Dollar Princess." But the great hall of the hotel emptied earlier than usual. I wonder whether any of the women wont to their dressmakers before they went homo to dinsn.