Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1876-06-01
The Spring Bonnet Question.

IN the spring a young mans fancy
lightly turns to thoughts of love but in
the same season the consuming desire of
the average woman is to obtain a satisfac-
tory bonnet. If women possessed the
privilege of suffrage, the constitutional
provision for spring election would have
been mistake. At that period of the
year the questions involved in the selec-
ton of bonnet override and trample out
| almost every other issue. Whether Turkey
is likely to be dismembered; whether
Bristow or Blaine shall be President:
whether specie payments shall be resumed
IN 1879; whether the Mediterranean can
really be drained into the Sahara, these
ana all similar matters, though they prom
lse natural or political commissions, are
forgotten when the spring bonnet looms
up as a thing impending in the imme-
| diate future.
Inc preliminary preparations for the
purchase are made, perhaps, in church.
where, while the ears of the sveraqe
woman are receiving the gospel truth, her
eyes are comparing the merits of the
various styles about her; in the horse car.
where every wearer Of a striking bonnet,
for moment after entering, is the con
scIous focus of feminine interest. in the
street, where the average woman in the
vernal season, never fails to twist The
muscles OF her neck in attempting to OBJ
serve how passing bonnet looks from
oehlad; and in the shop windows, which
are thronged with eager students of the
various modes. And so, when the "open-
ing day" arrives, the average woman
with fifty different ideals floating in
hazy atmosphere in her mind, enters upon
the task OF purchasing the article that she
desires. When, after much hesitation.
elaboration and discussion. certain
style has been selected she orders the
bonnet to be trimmed, and she goes away
with feeling of relief, which, before she
reaches home, gradually changes to a con-
vlction that the very worst stvle of all has
been chosen. And thus, when the bonnet
reaches her, she pronounces it "hideous,"
and proceeds to pick it to pieces with the
IL.
When the work of reconstruction is
completed the bonnet is not satisfactory.
No spring bonnet ever was The very
loveliest of them is worn with q secret
and oppressive belief that something about
1t might have been improved. But when
it has been trimmed and re-trimmed until
the task becomes wearisome and heart
sickenlng, and until the owner is almost
ready to curse the day when such tor
ments of the spirit and the flesh were in
vented, 1t is at last accepted as an unsatis-
factory shape, as the best that can be done
with the material. Bat the first time that
1t is worn, the owner perhaps observes
that Mrs. Brown, whom she meets in the
street, has her feather upon the right side,
and another piecemeal reorganization is
undertaken, only to be repeated afterward
when tits perceived that Mrs. Jones bon
net, with the feather upon the left side,
looks far better than the bonnet of Brown.
Partial contentment perhaps might come
with the disposition of the feather in
accordance with the mode of Jones, if the
church that Mrs. Smiths bonnet is the
most beautiful of all, with a feather on
each side and perhaps one in the middle
There is no comfort in the service of the
sanctuary upon the day when such d dis
covery is made. The average woman re-
turns home with feeling strong upon her
that there are some trials in life which can
hardly be reached even by the consultations
of religion.
The direst agony usually is over when
the season is thus far advanced: but the
sum of misery that yet remains in the
discomfort with the spring bonnet as it is
in its final form is merely dreadfulto con-
template. What the remedy shall be only
female philosophers can decide. Sheer
bareheadedness would seem to offer per-
manent relief, and to the tyrant man there
would appear to be very little risk to
physical health in a change from bon
net that is pinned to the extreme rear
of the back hair to no bonnet at all. But
if a headdress of some kind really is re-
garded as a necessity, perhaps com
promise might De maze al some comfort
able point between the folded towel worn
upon the head ofthe Italian peasant woman
and the gorgeous mass of flowers, frippery
and fol-de-rol which form the vexatious
spring bonnet of the woman of America.
-PhsLadelph5a Bulletin.
Shattered Constitutions Rebuilt.
In the use Of wholesome invigorant lies
the only hope Of rebuilding shattered con-
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