MORALITY OF THE PRESENT FASHIONS.

Southland Times, Issue 870, 23 December 1867, Page 1 (Supplement)

MORALITY OF THE PRESENT FASHIONS.

The gross absurdity, bordering almost on the obscene, characteristic of some phases of the present fashions, is dealt with in a severe but just manner by the Saturday Meview of the 13th of July, from which we extract the most salient poiats : — The use of poisonous cosmetics, and the exposure of the bosom have fre- j quently been the subject of unfavorable comment, but we are scarcely surprised these customs should have out-blazoned their censors— the one, at all events, is tolerable by gaslight, and the other has perhaps classic authority — nay, even the chignon, with its community of pediculus, is not so absolutely repulsive as

a new idea (the truth of which ia verified by correspondence leceived by the lasfc mail from England) for altering the appearance of the figure. The description of this most abominable of all the extravagancies of fashion is given by the Beview in plain and unmistakable diction —in fact, it calls "a spade a spade"— and if the writer had used language less broad but more insidious, he would not so completely have shown the effect of the denti temps. Of those limbs which it is still for* bidden to expose absolutely, the form and contour can at least be put in relief by insisting on the skirts being gored and straightened to the utmost ; indeed some of the riding-habifcs we have seen worn are in this respect so contrived that, when viewed from behind, especially when the wearer is not of too fairy-like proportions, they resemble a pair of tight trousers rather than the full flowing robe which we remember as so graceful and becoming to a woman. It Will be observed that the general aim of all these adventitious aids is to give an impression of earth and the fullness thereof, to appear to have a bigger cerebellum, a more sensuous development of limb, and a greater abundance of flesh than can be either natural or true ; but we are almost at a loss how to express the next point of ambition with which the female mind has become inspired. The women who 1 aret not as those who love their lords wish to 1 be — indeed, as we have heard, those who have no lords of their own to love — have conceived the notiou that, by simulating an ' interesting condition ' (we select the phrase accepted as the most delicate), they will add to their attractions ; and for this purpose an article of toilet — an indiarubber anterior bustle — called the demi-temps, has been| invented, and is worn beneath the dress, nominally to make the folds fall properly, but in reality, as the name betrays, to give the appearance of a woman advanced in pregnancy. • No person will be found to say that the particular condition, when real, is unseemly or ridiculous. What it is when assumed, and for such a purpose — whether it is not all that and something worse —we leave our readers to decide for themselves. It is said that one distinguished personage first employed crinoline in order to render more graceful her appearance while in this situation] but these ladies with their ridiculous demi-temps, without excuse as without shame, travesty nature in their own persons in a way which a lowcomedy actress woula be ashamed to do in a tenth-rate theatre. The name is French, let us hope the idea is also; and this reminds us of the title of a little piece lately played in Paris by amateurs for some charitable purpose — H iCy a plus d'enfans. No ;in France they may indeed say, 'It i 3 true il ny a plus d'enfans, but then have we not invented the demi-temps /" And if each separate point of female attire and decoration is a sham, so the whole is often a deception and a fraud. It is not true that by taking thought one cannot add a cubit to one's stature, for ladies by taking thought about it, do add, if not a cubit, at least considerably to their height, which, like almost everything about them, is often unreal. With high heels towpe, and hat, we may calculate that about four or five inches are altogether borrowed for the occasion. Thus it comes to be a grave matter of doubt, when a man marries, how much is real of the woman who has become his { wife, or how much of her is her own only in the sense that she has bought, and possibly may have paid for it. To use the words of an old writer, "As with rich furred conies, their cases are far better than their bodies; and, like the bark of a cinnamon-tree, which is dearer than the whole bulk, their outward accoutrements are far more precious than their inward endowments." Of the wife elect, her bones, her debts, and her caprices may be the only realities which she can bestow on her husband. All the rest — hair, teeth, complexion, ears, bosom, figure, including the demi-temps — are alike an imposition and a falsehood. In such case we should recommend, for the sake of both parties, that during at ' least the wedding tour, the same precautions should be observed as when Louis XV. travelled with ' the unblushing Ohateauroux, with her bandboxes and rougepots at his side, so that at every new station a "wooden gallery had to be run up between their lodgings."