LADIES' Column. The Art of Dress. Past and Present.

Waikato Times, Volume XXIII, Issue 1893, 23 August 1884, Page 6 (Supplement)

LADIES' Column. The Art of Dress. Past and Present.

We have read somewhere that some old ecclesiastic defined woman as " an animal which delights in finery." But if we are to believe authorities like Planchc", Fairholt, and others too numerous to mention, not one single excess or caprice has appeaed in the attire 6i woman but has at some time had its counterpart on j the person of man. They have had largo sleeves, tight waists, and full petticoata. They have worn long hair and earrings, sport* ed stays and stomachers, muffs and bewitching love locks. They have rouged and patch* ed, padded and laced. Where we had Wreathed lace ruffa round our slender throats, they had buttoned costly Brussels round their lega. Where we carry our mirror openly in our fans, they slily conceal theirs in their waistcoat pockets. In fact, wherever we look into the history of mankind, whether through the annals of courtiers, or the evidence of painters, or through the researches of one of our own sex, we find two animals equally fond of dress— men and women 1 In these our own days of radical reform, however, the male costume haa gradually become reduced to a mysterious combination of the unpicturesque and the inconvenient. Hot in Bummer, cold in winter, useless either for keeping off sun or rain ; stiff, but not always plain, neither durable nor becoming — not even cheap. Still, each one who attempts to alter or embellish, only gets credit for more vanity than his fellows, if not for vulgarity. With woman it is different. She haa in all ages been a creature obviously intended for elegant wardrobes and brilliant adornments. Let no woman suppose that a man is ever indifferent to her appearance. The instinct may have been deadened in his mind by a slatternly mother or plain sisters ; but the instinct for admiration of suitable dress in the softer sex is always there. But let us put aside the plain law of instinct in such matters ; there remains another, perhaps a still more striking one, for the promotion of suitable dressing and well- cut clothes— the law of selfinterest, a powerful motive to most of as. It is all very well for bachelors ,to be restricted to a costume which expresses nothing ; but for our spinsters to take the same outward neutrality would be so obvious a mistake as hardly to need any further comment. With those of habitual delicaoy of mind, dress becomes a kind of personal glossary, the study of whioh it would be madness to neglect. We hive read in some book of past generation that an old " bead " o! the period professed to " tell i the humor of a woman from the color of her hood." We go

further, and maintain that, to a proficient in the science, every woman appears with her leading qualities marked, as it were, on her garments. Now imagine to yourself a few such scenes As the following : — You encounter a lady, she may be pale or rosy', stout of thin. She is always noticeable for something singular and oittrb in her dress. A hat with all the colors of the rainbow about it, or a new color never before imagined ; a gown so badly cut or so badly trimmed that she cannot lean baoß in it ; a olofik so fashioned that graceful walking is impossible in it 5 a quilling which scratches heir, and catches everybody else ; beads from Nova £embla, Or feathers from Africa, she wears all with a piteous, dejected look, as if she were a martyr in the service. She is wretched ; she knows she is not looking well ; but She is so afraid of being out of the pale of " la mode " that she plunges into the most singular extremes to be perfectly sure she is in it. Fashion She considers an awfal power, whom it is impossible to serve with Any comfort to oneself ; and accordingly she is never satisfied that she is "fashionable," unless she feels herself perfectly miserable also. Another figure now appears before our mind's eye, equally extravagant in her way, only with this difference, that she has opinions of her own of the most prononcS kind. She will wear the largest patterns and the gaudiest colors in the moat ordinary materials, She will have a quantity of sham lace, mock far, or false jewellery. She is not rich enough to have real ones ; but srftart she must be ! Of she may be rich, and then she will-mix up the best of everything together; pearla on her head, camoea on herjneck, and diamonds in her ears and on her arms. Her hair is disposed of in long curls or curious braids. Either her skirt covers an incredible circumference, or, beneath a body which hardly covers any space at all, you catch glimpses of sub- textures neither neat nor fine. You may easily guess that this fair one is both vain and vulgar, probably bold also. We will pass lightly over those who make a point of having no rule of fashion, except to depart from the prevailing one. They have short gowns when others wear long ones, and vice verso. They wear their hair in a "crop," "being foity years of ago, or Array themselves in innocent white for a party of two hundred. They call themselves " strong-minded," but have in fact no refinement of mind at all, have usually coarse manners and loud voices. Behold another type, whose ideas on " dross " are, if possible, yet more eccentric. Either a powerfnl straw hat or a massive velvet bonnet covers her head. The hair is drawn bick tightly Off the forehead, and fastened in a sort of round ball at the back of her neck. Nature has given her a somewhat abundant supply of that crowning beauty to our sex, hair — hair, too, of a soft silky texture, capable of much judicious and becoming arrangement. But that " would give too much trouble ; " she has "no time " for such frivolities. A knitted shawl of coarse materials, or what was once a black scarf, but has now a deep frilled trimming added on to give the look of a mantle, serves to cover her shoulders. A dress of no describable cut, but of the shade best understood as " dingy," hangs in an empty manner about her, sloping in towards the feet. If it is winter, probably she has on a stiff squirrel boa and glovea known as " merino," or even it may bo leather of some kind of the " cheap and nasty " order. She is not an old woman. She is, indeed, one born with all the surroundings of a gentlewoman, and has received the education of such, but she is superior to all petty vanities. She tells her dressmaker, " Make it as you will, don't ask me ; only let me be clean and neat, and I shall be quits satisfied." she is, in fact, scrupulously dean, but also hopelessly " dowdy." Far different from all the for egoing, is the dress of the real " gentlewoman," the truly refined and sensible of her sex. Her first study is lo seek the becoming, her second the good, her last what is merely " fashionable." She cleverly adapts the fashions to herself. She will not stoop to make herself a mere figure for the modiste to hang her wares on. Whatever laws fashion dictates she follows lawa of her own, and is never behind the times. She wears many nice things, but probably the most becoming of them have been fashioned by her own taste, even perhaps j finished by her own deft; fingers, or at least i she has carefully superintended their manui factors. But for all this, many a neighbor may i have sneered at her, envying the tasty toilettes. " Her poor husband working so hard, and she spend'nghis hardly earned coin ifi French ; fripperies." All this while her costume is rarely very rich, often not even new, as she lovingly remembers the " bread winner " at home. Butitia always prettilymado.no tinsel, no trumpery lace, no sham gem. All is fresh 1 and simple, good of their kind ; collars, cuffs, frills, and gloves alike faultless. After all ' there is no great art either in her fashions or in the materials. The secret consists in her knowing the grand unities of dresa — her own station, her own ago, and her own good points. Above all, she takes care that her plainest and cheapest dress shall be well cut. She need not be beautiful, nor even accomplished; but we will answer for her being even tempered, thoroughly sensible, and that very rare jewel in the present fast-going days, a complete "lady" — a gentlewoman "in its fullest and best sense. In conclusion, we are much of the dame opinion as the noble author of " Childe Harold : " Somehow those same gootl looks, Make more impression than the best of hooks. " Vne laidcur intercssante," as Balzac expresses it, may do very well for the sterner sex ; but ladiea, be advised ! Unless your beauty exceeds the wildest visions of the poets, do not be careless on the point of dress. If you consider with many, that woman 'a province is to maks herself pleasing in the sight of those popularly called " lords of the creation," if you d«sire to become happy wives and mothers, then have a sensible regard for your personal appearance. The first Napoleon himself, even Goethe, that wonderful autocrat of German literature for nearly half a century, entertained, we are assured, the strongest opinions as to th/ 3 effects producible by good and suitable dressing. A well-dressed stranger would always have more chance of an interview with the veteran poet than an homely comer, no matter how learned he might be. Countrywomen, see what an array of reasons for a due and proper regard to the art of dreas I No matter how rich and costly the material of your robe may be, if it is badly cut, and planned without taste, you will never look well in it. Your money will have been wasted, and (dare we hint it?) perhaps even your eweet temper soured, like that of the Greek father of whom mention has already been made. — M, H. G. in the Queen.