THE TROUSERS QUESTION.

Thames Star, Volume VII, Issue 2594, 1 May 1877, Page 3

THE TROUSERS QUESTION.

It is one which will not down. - Modern usage in at least three-fourths of Europe, nearly all of North' America, one-half of South America, and in a few Asiatic countries, has established the fact that the garment called trousers is the best yet invented,for mankind. We do not now refer to the frantic attempts of some of the other sex to possess themselves of the coveted but ungraceful gark The Spaniard and the SpanishAmerican ornament their trousers with bell-buttons and gilt braid, and the wild (3omanphe and Cheyenne ineffectually try to disguise their leggings . with buckskin fringe and dyed bird-quills; and the fashion of the cut of the trouscr changes with every clime. But, variously called or decorated, the trouser may be said to denominate one-half oi the globe. We may as well submit to this state of facts with what grace we can. It is evident that though the garment may not be the highest form of modern civilisation, it is closely identified with human progress, and is certainly a distinguishing badge of the master race. That it gives vigor to the wearer, as well as deftness in handling the tools of power, is conceded.

Any man who doubts it has only to look at a Turkish carpenter sawing a board which he holds with his toes, or gaze upon an infatuated '^wonian trying to split wood. There have been a few feeble attempts to recall the knee-breoclies of our ancestors. Those £9ithetjc persons who believe that mediaeval bedsteads "and Byzantine frying-pans are the perfection of art and comfort in their way, would make us put ourselves into doublets and hose. We suspect this attempt at putting the world back into its old clothes, as well as into its old furniture, would have been more persistently pressed if it were not for the fact that aesthetic enthusiasts are likely to have thin legs. An aesthetic person with stuffed calves would be an unreal mockery. The art critic is not hing if not " sincere." The better part of the world sticks to its.trousers, and we may as well make-a merit of it. Japan was considered-as only ''getting tragically out of f bed "so long as : she insisted upon wearing the flowing; robe of ancient times. But when the Mikado had his photograph taken, and sat on a chair, and wore black doeskin trousers, it was agreed that a great revolution had occurred and that old things had passed away. China cannot expect to be admitted into the family of nations so long as her men-wear petticoats. An Arab riding in a Broadway street car, with an embroidered jacket and fez, is not a startling sight. His trousers, though baggy, are his passport to the common place. ..■■■'■ . Is it a wonder, then, that trousers being so firmly fixed in the affections, interests, and, usages of the world, - the artistes are in despair ? It is almost impossible for a painter to. make a dignified fulllength picture of a man in trousers* Look at Gilbert Stewart's portrait of Washington in. knee-breeches, and at Miss Ransom's picture of General Thomas in trousers. No invidious: comparison between painters is intended; but the legs of the' father : of his country have bones in them. The blue trbuser of the commander of the army of the Cumberland are stuffed with ,cotton. This expieriment has been, so often repeated: that painters now prefer to cut off their 'hapless subject? just above the knees. The kit-cat is the only canvass fit for a generation of trou-sers-wearers. As we are passing into a time when modern heroes and statesmen are to be celebrated in bronze and marble, sculptors are making statuary figures which are demigods only above the waist--band of their trousers. All the genius which was put on Bartholdi's figure of Lafayette, and A. K. Brown's equestrian Washington, in Union-square, could not make a^ good fit of the neighboring Lincoln's trousers. It is all ow-ing to the costume of the period. Mr Quincey Adams Ward made a graceful statue of his Shakespeare in slashed doublet and hose. We should be glad to see him struggle with, the columnar legs of the " Webster " which lias just been set up in the same park. The " godlike Daniel is certainly deified in enduring bronze; even the shingly coat-tails may escape criticism. Those perpendicular trousers are fatal. Some wise writer has argued that if diplomatists in foreign parts go to court in acostume of Louis XIV. grafted on that of George 111., we may safely adopt their garb as a sort of picturesque compromise for pictorial purposes. Indeed, some artists, in sheer despair over the sartorial integuments of the present day, have deliberately painted . their patrons in a sort of antique masquerade. Women, of course, may (nay, they do) dress in the fashion of any of the centuries without causing a sneer of reproach, and lads rigged out in jackets and collars of the time of the first Charles Stewart are prettily picturesque; But the portrait of a respectable grocer or cordwainer clad in mediaeval costume is mirth-moving. All the skill of the artist will not save Mr Gunnybags from being ridiculous when painted as Francis 1., or as a Roman senator. It is a commonplace age, and the trouser is the badge of commonplaceness, if we may use that phrase. Perhaps it is because we are so utilitarian and free from antique nonsense that we are so prosperous and contented as a people. So we may well cling to the trouser as the last hope of national vigor and constitutional liberty. —New York Times.