THE LADIES’ WORLD.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXVI, Issue 2376, 17 December 1908, Page 7

THE LADIES’ WORLD.

THE COMFORT OF EVENING DRESS.

There is a great deal of common sense in what an Australian writer says about the neglect of evening in Australia, and, reading it, one is reminded of the horror expressed by a recent visitor to New Zealand, a much-travelled lady, when she found that so many people, men and women, wore the same clothes all day long. 0?-course one reason that keeps people in their walking attire for the evenings is that they frequently go out after the eveningg meal to -places where evening dress is not required. Still, what this 1 writer says is true, and more especially true in regard to girls who are working away from home all day. Evening dress, she says, means a great deal more than wliatwe used to call ' ‘low neck and short sieves” in our infancy. It means getting out of hot, and quite frequently dusty garments, into something easy and "becoming. The mother -r*±o encourages her daughters in the evening dress habit is doing them a real kindness, especially if the eaid daughters are workers. There is something unbelievably refreshing in getting into fresh clothes. It rests as well as exhilarates, while its effect on the male members of the family is such that the habit quite frequently proves itself a contagious one. ''The man who changes his clothes, even if he only replaces his coat with a dinner jacket or even a blazer, ds nearly always a much more peaceable quantity th,an the man who has "no time for tfSit sort of foolery.” A few shilling’s worth of muslin will make a little frock into which the housewife can "slip” with the best results. No woman is- even "past muslin” nowadays, but nun’s veiling presents itself as an inexpensive substitute. Frocks of this description are a real economy, since nothing takes the heart- out of a street dress like wearing it indoors. To wear out old balldresses as evening dresses is hardly 3>ardonable, but with very little adjus men. t the muslins Jand voiles of last yearyf'rnn easily be- induced to end their days with honor as home evening frocks.

THE PARLOR CONDEMNED. Sir Oliver Lodge does not believe in parlors. At the exhibition of some model houses in England recently he expressed the belief that it would be far healthier for families to -have one large, airy, comfortable living room than two small rooms, one to dive in and the other to be carefully shiit up and kept "for best.” It is an opinion with,, which most people- interested in mattiVs of health and comfort will agree; for nothing could be more foolish than for the whole family to crowd -into lone tiny living room, while the much-needed space of the "front room” goes to waste. It is -an extraordinary ideal that influences people to furnish their rooms and sacrifice their comfort and well-being by doing so. It is on a level with the feeling that prompts people to fill their shelves with dummy books. JUST AS IN GISBORNE. Anijrisliman writing to an English paper about women’s franchise in Australia says that he .has heard "there is a marked increase of politeness and refinement- among men on the -day of an election, which used to be mode ian excuse, as I fear it is too y hrten done in these our home countries, for -roughness and rudeness. The Australian men, feeling that they have amongst them women at the polling-booths, feel too that there is a restraint demanded of them, and their natural sense of chivalry shows itself in an absence of all disorder and roughness, and they gallantly extend to woman’s influence a gentleness and politeness oil this day of natural excitement, which shows itself not only in their intercourse with women, but in their conduct with one another.

TWO GOOD RECIPES. Beef Steak Pudding.—-Half-pound flour,- -fib suet, 1 teaspoonful baking powder, 21b beef steak, 2 kidneys, 2 teaspoon-fids salt, \ teaspoonful of peppen. cold water. Slired and chop the suet, and mix it with the flour, baking powder, and salt. Mix to a stiff paste with cold water, and -line a well-greased pudding basin. Mix the two teaspoonfuls- of flour, pepper, and salt together, cut- the meat and kid-iffe-y small, and mix them with the seasoned flour. Fill the basin, half fill with cold water, and cover with crust. Tie down with a damp pudding cloth, and boil for four hours. Pancakes.—Three ounces of flour, l pint of milk, 3 eggs, a pinch of salt. Mix the flour and salt together in ajiasin. Add the milk gradually and mix to -a smooth paste. Beat the eggs well and add them. Make enough dripping or butter hot in the frying-pan to well-grease the pan. Pour in enough batter to cover the bottom of the pan, turn with a knife or toss, brown the other side, turn out on- a warm dish, sprinkle with sugar, and squeeze a little lemon juice over. Roll up and: serve at once. Pancakes' must never stand long after being cooked or they get tough. l -