Washington standard. [volume] (Olympia, Wash. Territory) 1860-1921, 1879-05-16

of low temperature, and the novel
position is taken by some good au-
thorities that, delicate as women are
usually adjudged to be, they can stand
a far greater degree of cold without
serious results than men. A De-
troit physician of extensive practice
and observation, reasoning in har-
mony with the views of a large major
ity of<he profession, declares that
| the difference in male and female
dress whould justify the mortality
reports of any large city in re-
cording the death of ten women
to one man. This is a bold as
sertion, but one which cannot be
denied; and in the Urited States,
especially, it is equally applicable to
the Atlantic or Pacific Coast States.
If, as all believe, nature makes no
mistakes, there must be glazing
discrepancy somewhere in the adapt
ability of dress to personal comfort.
1t may be safely concluded that if
there is any of the angel in woman,
she must have descended from o
hardy stock. From infancy, she is
iLured to the ightest clothing, nay,
even taught to consider it vulgar to
wear any garment merely for the
sake of the comfort it secures as
! protection against the cold. So vir-
tually inbred does this principle ap-
| pear to be, that the whole system of
female attire is built up on the as
sumption that attractive display and
not sheer comfort, is the great end of
clothing. We seriously doubt wheth-
er a fashionable dress maker or mil
liner ever thinks of hygienic princi-
pies or requirements when she is
cutting and fitting a garment that is
designed to cover those portions of
the body beneath which lie the vital
organs. Whether or not it is in keep
ing with the latest style" and " be-
coming" are the weighty questions
which tax the brain of both maker
and wearer, buyer and seller. A few
years ago, when " flowing sleeves"
were worn, young lady in Ohio
went on fifteen mile sleigh-ride
when the mercury stood sixteen de-
grees below zero, with no other COW
ering from the wrists to the elbows
than a piece of Grape that would not
stop the breath Of mosquito. She
was fashionably dressed, indeed,
and had a grand time. but she frozo
both her arms and was made help
less cripple for the remainder OF her
miserable life. A large share of the
lingering complaints that now affiict
thousands of women in the Atlantic
and Middle States are attributed by
the best physician to the criminal per-
sistence with which they chung to the
rigid claims of fashion in dressing
themselves during the severe Winter
just past. The following extract
from q remonstrative article in n
paper published in one of the North
ern cities, q few weeks ago, will con-
vey a sufficiently clear idea OF the
manner in which ladies in good cir
cumstances@ clothed themselves for
outdoor exercise during the unpre-
cedented cold term of January and
February last:
| Today, you will meet men on the streets
| with pulsewarmerS, heavy overcoats, fur
4 caps, WOODEN understanding, thick socks,
4 etc., and ahead and behind them YOU will
i see women in almost Summer attire. Men
| are brought up to look on women as frail:
| delicate creatures, and to be tenderly cared
for, and vet there are hundreds of them in
every town and city who can and do en-
dure more to the physical system than
men dare attempt A woman will wear q
two ounce bonnet to church or to the opera
and make no complaints. A n0ar.goes out
wearing seal-skin cap, and perhaps has
his ears frost-bitten Thousands OF women
! wear Gotten stockings all Winter long,
while mems toes are nipped through warm
wooden socks.
The great majority Of women do not
wear wooden under clothing. AT least
ninety men out of every hundred wear
either red fannels or merinoS, and yet
they seem to suffer more than women.
Men will wear double mittens while q
woman will put on kids and seem to feel
4 no cold. "A mans beaver overccat alone
will weigh as much as all the garments
put on by a woman in this weather, and
vet he is the one who complains of the
chilly winds. During the last polar wave
which rolled owe: this section, when the
street-car horses were covered with ice
and the frost on the windows was nearly
quarter Of an inch thick, ladies rode up
and down in kid gloves and light hornets
and made no complaint, though strong,
robust men in the same car, dressed as
warmly as men can dress in this country,
could not sit still for the cold.
If those influential women who are
now spending so much time, talent