The Cincinnati daily star. [volume] ([Cincinnati, Ohio]) 1875-1880, 1879-08-30
UGLY PEOPLE.

UGLY PEOPLE.
We wonder whether any woman if
suitably attired is really ugly. 1t would
be bold assertion to say that none
really are so, for after all the question of
peoples looks is, whether men or women,
to a great extent, a matter of fashion,
and hence of clothes. The Chinese plan
of making it the duty of Mandarin to
say what day people shall put on or
leave off their summer or winter attire,
and what their style shall be, absolutely
possesses such luxury Of simplicity as to
make one sigh for a residence in the
Flowery Kingdom.
Think what comfort to bring out
your last seasons bonnet, or cloak, or
necktie, or hoop-skirt, or waterfall, or
anything knowing that the autocratic
Mandarin had settled that you should
put it on the day before Easter or the
second Sunday after the Epiphany, and
that Mrs. McShoddy and the Gunnybag
family, if they come out to church, are
compelled to appear in exactly the same
harness. Reflect, oh husbands and
fathers, of the economy Of having to sup
ply but one gown each to your fashion
able wife or daughter the ensuing season,
and the happy consciousness that your
slumbers could not be disturbed by the
horrifying intelligence that some one
else's manageable daughters had out
blazed your own with trail half yard
or so the longest at thoi last kettledrum
OF reception.
Probably the least becomingly attired
people one meets are, as a rule, those
who affect the style par excellence, who
dress the "loudest," and seek to lead
everybody else; those who adopt the
last agony Of absurdity and expect to
get stared at by people in the street.
These are the folks who want what
nobody else has if reported as the latest,
and who drop a garment like a hot po-
tato, however becoming or comfortable
or suitable, as soon as its form is adopted
by some one else lower in social standing
than themselves. Why this everlasting
shifting from one fashion to an ther
without other aim than novelty? Persons
in INDECENT Or even moderate circum-
stances are made constantly unhappy by
their inability to afford to discard gar
ments that are pronounced by social
DEGREES antiquated, and thousands are
absolutely deprived of the opportunity
to attend public worship, because they
can not go in fashionable clothes, and
will not go otherwise.
Women will discard a hat or garment
neat and suitable, and sensible, and
withal becoming, for one that is neither,
because some milliner, OR dressmaker, or
friend assures them it is the mode, and
straightway they will don the hideous
thing and sail smiling down the street, a
picture for comic almanac to repro
duce, not because the wearer is intrinsi-
cally ugly, but because the thing is un-
suited to her face, or figure, Or complex
ion, or age, or stature. We have seen
men who in the bath have forms of gods,
but who in a swallow-tailed coat and
stove-pipe hat are clowns. We have seen
men models of manly beauty when looked
at in the careless abandon of the work
shop, but who were as graceless as a to-
bacco sign when starched and costumed
after the tailor's last fashion plate.
Positively there is room for Manda-
rim of aesthetics, if the genius of our
Government only permitted it, whose
duties might be to pass in critical review
those men and women who have set
their hearts on looking pretty and don't
know how, in order that they may be
saved from adopting costumes as un-
suited to their use and style as a rufled
shirt is to a Piute Indian brave. In the
absence of such functionary ask some
friend of discretion what is suitable,
dresses for comfort first of all, but remem-
ber that "handsome is that handsome
does" and keeping this maxim always
before you there really ought not to be
any absolutely ugly people in the world.