THE Wairarapa Age MORNING DAILY. TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 7, 1911. THE ETERNAL FEMININE.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 10470, 7 November 1911, Page 4

THE Wairarapa Age MORNING DAILY. TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 7, 1911. THE ETERNAL FEMININE.

In a delightful article wibioh. lie lias 'contributed- to the Argus, Professor Tucker, of Melbourne, .summarises some of .tile results of recent excavations in Crete. It was discovered long, ago that the wonderful island had beein tlie centre of a mighty Mediterranean Powier whose history had grown old enough to become legend by the time Home was founded. The latest research has reevaled details of the Oretaji life of perhaps 4000 years ago, and Professor Tuoker has been good enough to describe one plha.se of them. , His text . is "the eternal feminine," aaid he shows that by dint of countless strivings towards "up-to-dateness" in. dress, women hlave managed to reach almost exactly th.ei (point at .which they arrived in< the early date of Crete. Externally, Profeseor Tucker declares, tine woman of to-day might be a Cretan lady of a date before Aibraham. Tllie veil of time has been rent away by the unearthing of a. picture which .sfliiowis a lady in indoor costume. "A prying eye will discover," writes the> professor, "that the skirts are the dividted 'article, and that tli > Cretan modiste had contrived to hit upon; a 'jupon a la harem' infinitely superior to the abortive expav.ments

which confounded Paris only a few month® back." l'lie writer •? a.blo to back up this statement with ujiiiripeadhlablo photiographis of pictores of fcho harem skirt and otlneo - Ires-.es. Qno-oi these represents tiiie walking oostuu.e of a nuatronly lady, who, Professor Tucker observes w'r.h evident truth, might walk albng Collins Street in Melbourne "without oreafcing more remark than is usual'y uudergone by her sex in that vicinity.'' By im.ea.nis of comparing and ouvioing a number of incomplete paintings, eaigravangis, and carvingsi, the professor has assured himself that the fashion in Crete 4000 yea,rs ag<; included "a strikingly modern liat of largo size, corsets scrupulously tightened at the waist, flounced and fuirbelowod skirts, 'clocked' stockings, and high-heeled (shlo-es." The dJ!seov>eriesi are all .intensely interesting, but they (must be a little discomforting to the eternal feminine of to-day, and it certainly is disappointing to learn that when Ariadne elop- | ed with Theseus;, the first thing she I asikecl him probably, was how be liked ' li-er hat.