WOMEN AT REST.

Dominion, Volume 5, Issue 1533, 31 August 1912, Page 11

WOMEN AT REST.

A MODERN CULT. Women are beginning to look upon restfulness as a new cult, Bays a writer in the London "Daily Telegraph." The younger generation know little about the ideals of their predecessors of a couple of generations ago, so they think they have discovered something new. It may bo that tho revival of days gone past, the digging into relics of old timos undertaken in the search for fancy enstumes, has shown something of tno charm of olden times. Certain it is that throughout Europe and America tho women of to-day aro finding that tho strenuous life is much less practical than that which gave a woman something of tho reposo immortalised amongst tho classics. Scarcely a woman to-day among tho younger generation fails to follow some pursuit , that counteracts. the nerve-rack-ing excitement considered necessary oven by her mother. Tho days of extraordinary exertions have gone past. Girls of to-day have learned that they must tako things quietly if they wish to preserve their youth and beauty. American women have ceased to discuss the simple life from a romantic point ot' view; they are living it. The woman who can afford to buy land of her own, and to see to its cultivation herself does so. Employers of labour do not rest satisfied with handing over their estates to thoso who, apply .manual skill to their acres. Agriculture is a favourite subject, and thero aro numerous owners of vast estates who know just as much about all that pertains to. them as any man ever did. Agriculture is a pastime, and an entirely engrossing one. While some women seek holiday shelter in electrical rest-rooms, " others spend some months of the year in the country under shady trees. Hence the many women who acqniro cottages in villages far from .town life. They put forth endless endeavours to find old-world decorations, hangings that keep glaring light out of rooms, quaint, high-backed chairs, lounges that are not Oriental and enervating, but those of English design of the Georgian days, when women regarded dignity and

repose as the first 'attributes of good breeding. In country homes chintzes are brought out. Flower decorations must be few, because the spell of a simple room worA! bo broken. Young women following the example of tho Queen, are using their needles and tambour-frames again, so that while one-half of the fashion a rue world rushes from country to country, tho other rests, nud spends the fleeting hours in recreation that soothes nerves instead of exciting them. Parisian women are building rock gardens on the roofs of their houses, each society devotee passing some period cf the morning hours either in doing tho work of attending to her ferns herself, or in lounging in a long chair whilst she watches others at woTk. The more elaborate the garden the better. . Much, of course, depends on the size of tho roof, the cult being an expensive one, and. not for the majority. A long time has elapsed since the women of Berlin dwelt in garden houses during, the summer months, wore sandals and_ the rational dress that has developed into beautifully embroidered robes. • _ Aviculture is one of the last fancies to find _ appreciation, and the pleasure in looking after, beehives is not limited to the women ,of any one nation. There is a little story of an American woman who had worn herself, to a wreck from nerves. Someone gave her a hive .of bees as a present. They amused and interested her. She learned how to niaaage them, with the result that she is now a healthy woman. Instead of lying on a couch in her garden, listening to the hum of bees anw-ngst flowers, she has become a good business woman, owning at least sixtj hives, employing several people, and" making fine profit out of honey. It would not be difficult to multiply examples of the ivay nraV-n taste is tending. Nct. if convincing proof were required, would it be hard to find tlini tho cult of rest, amongst th.- young women of to-day has been revived.