THE LADIES

Observer, Volume 7, Issue 232, 21 February 1885, Page 8

THE LADIES

Next to trying to gain the ear of a deaf man, the hardest thing in the world is to catch the attention of a cross-eyed woman. The , coming rage in hair is a soft and tender red, like that of a tomato which has grown old and lost usefulness. " I love the very ground she treads on," said a Kati Kati man. She owns over 300 -*■■. acres; 1 "Do not marry a widower," said an old lady. " A ready-made family is like a plate of cold potatoes." " Oh, I'll soon warm them," replied the damsel. Servant-galism again ! Hubby : Just off — home to dinner — and I should like a shoulder of mutton to-day. Wife : Impossible, my dear ; Maria says she prefers beef. (•Fact.} She was a hallelujah lass. "My husband opposed my attending the barracks," she said, but I can truly say I received a blessing, and when I return he will get a blessing." And no" one doubted it. "I wanted*to call him Oscar," remarked 'the happy father of a new addition to the progeny* of the Western 'Bus Company. ' ' Oh, yes ; but call the next Car'line," said a shareholder in the Auckland Tramway Company. " Why' don't you bang your hair now ?" asked a fond hubby in Parnell of his betterhalf. "Why, my love?" she' enquired. " Well, I Avas only thiuking if you did, you'd give the piano a rest !" She banged him instead. An up-country clergyman, who holds very straight-laced ideas on the subject of dress ! reform, gave orders that no lady wearing a I big dress-improver should be allowed to enter his church, and was surprised when his congregation dwindled away to half-a-dozen. There was nothing to induce the ladies to atteri^.— or the gentlemen either. Talk about trials at the telephone office. A big merchant " rung up " the other day with a twist like a muscular Italian organ-grinder, and wh'en he got the answering ring, yelled out, " Gimme the Police Station, the Hospital, and the .Lunatic Asylum " ; and then there came rippling over the wire, in a musical, melifluous female voice, " Don't you want the whole world?" The caprices of fashion are manifold, and the reasons for them past finding out. The last- edict, which, according to a Parisian journal, had its origin in England, is the banishment of the time-honoured stocking from the feminine wardrobe. In future, a lady's delicate extremities are to be clad only in double-soled boots. Modesty, of course, would forbid' slippers or the fascinating Oxford-ties under this regulation, so we will hope boots with fleecy linings are to be the only wear. Those who have made the subject a study, pronounce stockings to be not only useless, but injurious from a sanitary point of view. We live in an age of reform and revolution, and between " health congresses," hygienic regulations, and other improvements, the garments of our grandmothers will soon vanish from sight. Some of the sleek parsons and sympathetic lady parishioners who take such an affectionate interest in the souls of the poor — at fancy bazaars and charitable picnics — might well pluck a leaf out of the practical volume of a Mrs Whyte, a lady (a lady, mind you, though she's only the wife of a farm servant) residing in the unfashionable fishing locality of Aberdeen, in Fifeshire. A correspondent of the London Times relates how Mrs Whyte, ' during the height of the gale on the 28th October, between the blinding showers of rain and sleet, saAv the steamship William Hope in imminent danger of coming on shore in Aberdeen Bay. Proceeding from her cottage, she noted the spot where the vessel would come on shore, and was ready to receive the rope thrown to her ■by one of the crew. In doing so she exposed herself to no little danger in securing the end of the rope by passing it round her body, and planting her feet firmly on the beach, while the waves were washing round her, so that the crew were able to land. During all this time she was quite unaided. After getting the crew on shore, she attended to their wants and comforts. Self-made men are common enough in Auckland. There are men who began life wtln the proverbial half-crown and are now worth their hundred thousand pounds. So also we meet many self-made women. What are the qualities that make such a woman ? Ambition, tact, opportunity. The first in cites her to the boldest feats, and acts as a sort of moral tonic to urge her on, the guiding-star of her constitution. The second, tact, is a heavenr-bern gift which enables a woman to single out those who are likely to aid her in her career. For opportunity she must either vigilantly watch for it or make it for herself. There is no remorse greater to a woman of the world than to feel that she has let her opportunity slip through her ffngers. : 'j If her husband is not rich, and money is a good

deal, she can make him so by clever management. How many men in Auckland owe their success in* the' world to the brains of their wives, tM tireless, patient, help, the spuF when needed, the good counsel, the comfort, the good-temper, the skilful management ? When she has made a fortune — or, in other words, made her husband make one — she is secure, everyone wishes to know her, her ways are ways of pleasantness and all her paths are peace. A lady's dress should be modest and%ecoming. Don't imitate the attire and manners of many of the young men of Auckland, dear girls. It is a free and easy style which displays itself in lounging, swaggering, smoking, and the Sultan style generally. But Avhy should not a young man in the society of ladies conform to a standard which would be equally becoming in a young woman ? Courtesy, thoughtfulness, kind consideration, respectful bearing in. action, posture, and tone, all the little details that comprise manner or good breeding, these are all as becoming to a man as to a woman. Strutting and swelling, and strident talking and laughing, " slang - whanging," and every other, form of selfish, boisterous, and rude behaviour ought not to be aped. by. women, not because they are common among 1 men, but because they are in themselves disagreeable and intolerable. Of course women will sometimes ". wear the breeches," but it is not necessary to forbid them to do so. . It is a mere matter of taste. In the east all the men wear loose, flowing skirts like women. The manly trousers are still unknown among the greater portion of the world's population. Neither sex "wears the breeches." The women don't wear them because they might be bowstrung, tied up in a bag and drowned, or mildly admonished some other way ; and the men don't wear 'cm — well, perhaps, because they dont wish to set a bad example to the women.