The Problem of 'Bagging' Trousers.

Te Aroha News, Volume VI, Issue 327, 22 December 1888, Page 5

The Problem of 'Bagging' Trousers.

A curious f iymposium ' on the problem of ' keeping trousers in good shape ' has been going the round of the New York press of late. The subject of trousers bagging at the knees is (says the ' Boston Sunday Herald') one of general and widespread interest. There are rich bankers, merchants, poets and statesmen who will to-night, before they retire, carefully fold up their trousers, lay them on a chair and place a heavy Bible or a pile of patent office reports on them, so that in the morning they will not be compelled to walk abroad with two bay windows located prominently at their knees. There are politicians who stop thinking of the tai'iff several times a week to give a little thought to this detail of dress, and attempt for the hundi'edth time to solve the harassing problem involved. The subject literally grows and swells on the thought, and the more the ordinary man thinks of it, the more he doesn't know how to prevent his trousers getting into this unsightly and ungraceful, not to say disgraceful condition. Some ingenious tailor came to the assistance not long ago of this victim from natural causes, and put upon the market a mechanical device which gripped the leg of the trousers near the pockets and near the bottoms, and stretched the intervening space. It was declared that if the garment was subjected to this treatment over night their shape would be conserved, and the worry and harassing thought which had heretofore been given to the subject would be no longer necessary. The price of these affairs was but Idol 50c, but the fashionable youngmen who used them said they did dot fulfil the promises made in connection therewith, and as the fakirs along Nassau-street began to sell a similar article a few months afterwards for one-quarter of a dollar, and as all the six-dollar boys in Wall-streefc offices were beginning to buy them, it became necessary to drop this. sort of thing anyway. The problem of wearing the trousers and retaining the graceful outlines characteristic of them as they come from the hands of the artistic tailor is, therefore, as far from solution now as ever.

The Advice of the 'Dudes.' Under these distressing circumstances, the editor took the expedient of interviewing the dndes on the subject. Mr Evander Berry Wall, who is described as ' The King of the Dudes of New York,' was thefirsfc applied to, and said that he fully recognised the importance of the subject, and had given it a great deal of earnest consideration. ' I have tried everything,' he continued, * or rather my man has, but 1 have found that the only way to keep trousers as they should be, and to prevent them from getting into the horrible condition characteristic of some men's clothing, is to wear them as little as possible and to have them ironed at intervals by careful and conscientious tailors.' Mr Frank Rooke, on the other hand, ' the best dressed man in Boston,' hangs his trousers by the ends and weights the pockets. ' A well-made pair,' he said, 'has hardly a legitimate excuse for bagging unless they are worn constantly. I myself never wear a pair two days in succes sion.' Finally, Mr Barclay Warburton, who 'enjoys the reputation of being: the most careful dresser in the Quakercity,' believes in the virtue of a clothes press. In the course of his interview, he also made the following remarks : — ' In the first place,' he said, 'I must say that I am very pleased to hear you call them trousers. You might have said pantaloons. A crentleman says trousers, an English gentleman calls them ' bags,' a cad calls them breeches, and only a ' genfc ' calls them pant&. I only wear a pair of trousers one day, and I don't know what my man does with them after that. To prevent their bagging for the twelve hours in which I wear them I have them lined around the knees with cardboard — and I never sit down.'