Green-Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1844-1884, 1874-03-18
Dress Reform.
= LECTURE TO LADIES, GIVEN IN BOSTON.

LECTURE To LADIES, GIVEN IN BOSTON.
LADIES Your presence here to-day
speaks we'll for the zeal you have in the
cause. | am delighted to find 50 many
here. and | shall address You on dress re-
form.
Thlt there is = growing discomfort
among women in regard to the wherewith
they are clothed. none can dispute. save
those who, having ears, hear not. Whence
arises this unrest, that like a great billow
has broken over the land? Its origin can
be distinctly traced to our growth We
have become women, and we desire to put
away childish things. When laws made
by our foreftthers are outgrown, when
they are found to clog the wheels of pro-
gress, they are modified, reScinded, and
stand rs dead letters upon the statutes. If
with enlarged spheres of action the styles
of dress imposed upon Us by the unfortu
nate women of Paris prove wholly insub-
servient to our needs, why accept them?
We have long since ceased to pay will
ing homage to this foreign despot, Fash
ion, and now, strengthened by the will
and voice of many, the protest against its
DEGREES has become so potent that we be-
gin to rejoice in the hope of soon being
able to consult our individual tastes, needs
and cOnvenienccs in dress aS in other mat
ters that pertain to our everyday life,
without being Il target for ridicule and
scorn. Wherever the gospel of dress re
form has been preached it has found wait
ing disciples. Encouraged to believe that
the time had come for union of effort in
this direction, an association of ladies was
formed here and in New York year since,
which has been doing good work, and
ferreting out the protean forms of evil
connected with dress. and in suggesting
remedies for the same.
The association has not arrived at anv
radical change in the eXternals of dress,
save those that pertain to greater SIM
| plicity, to a convenient length of skirts. to
/ less trimming, and hence less weight.
| Much has been done to call attention to
| improved methods in the making of under
garments, as well as in the material of
t which they are made. Several practical
/ inventions for the suspension of clothing
/ from the shoulders. for the lessening of
| the number of garments worn, and ut the
same time for the insuring of greater
warmth, are the outgrowth Of their inves-
/ LEGATIONS. In order TO have positive hygi-
enic evidence brought to bear upon the ills
entailed by improper dress, the association
has made arrangements to nave series OF
! six lectures delivered here and in New
York, mostly by women physicians.
In presenting to you some thoughts
upon the subject of dress l do not desire
you to accept my jpse di11 of right and
wrong, but hope you will probe the facts
presented, and if they appeal to your
common sense and reason as truths you
will heed them. not alone for your own
4 81.
as help and guide to others. Can any
lady of leisure who sits in her boudoir to-
day. who has no imperative call that makes
it necessary for her to face the binding
snow or pelting rain, who can spend hel
mornings in disha6ille. who can commant
carriage and horses to carry her and hel
dress appendages, can she look out from
E-her dam tsk-lined windows upon the hnr
ried throng of business women goins
e ,rly to the duties of the day and return
ing late from them, and can she say ther,