The southern press. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1850-1852, 1851-07-16

The peculiar form and diagnosis of this new
eruption in fashionable society has been literally
discussed, and it will be known to posteritv and
the rest of mankind, as the Home Book Of
Beauty" lts rise, progress, and specific char
acter will constitute standing topic of discus
sion during the summer, at all the watering
places; and we do not see how our proverbial
philanthropy can be more bcnefciay exercised
than by anticipating and gratifying curiosity on
this point
1t is known that for several years past an AN
nnaI has been published in England entitled the
Book of Beauty" containing portraits of such
Of England's naughty and titled beauties az
would consent to lend their features and their
names to the public. OF course, everything in
New York society must be an imitation Of some
thing in fashionable society in Europe. Of its
own independent self, society in New York has
not vitality enough to hang together a week.
Consequently, the women of New York must
have a" Book of Beauty" as well as their pro
totypes across the water. A publisher, an ar
fist, and an editor, were accordingly selected.
and after great deal Of sublime fiuttAration.
the artist was set to work-the list of favored
beauties" having been made ont entirely from
certain small and particularly vulgar coterie Of
our would e-tashionables--t the com plete ex-
clusoa of the ninety-nine other lotteries, each as
high born, AS eminent for talent and genius AZ
this. The list itself, too, upon examination,
turned out to be strangely compounded affair,
consisting mostly of respectable elderly ladies',
pretty high up in the forties-while the really
fresh, piquant, and rosy beauties, which even tho
coterie itself could have furnished, also got the
go-by. Here is a Book of Beauty" indeed -
which ought rather to he called I" Book Of
Female Antiquities and which will probably
ho n uork Of mn mt k, L.
chronological specimens and taxydermists, than
to the gay world.
However the Home Book of Beauty" such
it is, we are to have of certainty, with the
name of each ancient divinity engraved at full
length beneath her likeness The most recon-
dite portion, however, of this work, must neces-
sarily photographed notices accompanying each
portrait, and which are to be written by ladv of
some celebrity in the blue stocking world. We
confess that, as a staunch supporter of our new
fedged aristocracy, we wait the appearance of
these biographical sketches with some trepda-
ton. Cruelty debarred, as are our aristocracy,
from all titles and dignitics, by our miserable
constitution, there is yet, melancholy to relate,
no such work in existence as an American Peer
age; and we fear that our fair biographer will,
in some cases, tie puzzled to trace The pedigrees
of her illustrous subjects, and to know exactly
what to print and what to omit. In regard to
some of these distinguished families, their ORR
gin, we fear, is lost in the remote and fabulous
periods of antiquity while the modesty of all
is so well known, that one never, by any chance.
hears them mention word, even about their
graudfathers.
Now, the thing to be done is this: to supply
the learned biographies of the Home Book Of
Beauty" with the materials she may lack, owing
to the modesty and reserve Of her illustrous
subjects, so that her sketches may possess all
the fidelity Of history, well as the grace of
biography. Any one having a list Of the beam
ties who TO figure in the forthcoming vol
ume, and can furnish information of their au-
thensic pedigrees, relations, positions, ages, and
other interesting particulars, may apply--if hr
likes--to the edtress Of this dainty work.