The Sunday herald. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1866-1887, 1880-07-11
IMMoDEsT BATHING SUITS.


Plain Hints 10 visitors Who Summer
nj Fashionable Watering.PIaces--I
Perverted Taste Purports 20 Re, Hut
In Not, French.
You have doubtless many a time and oft
gazed in admiration upon series Of pictures,
made in Paris, and largely sent TO virtuous
America, which show exceedingly beautiful
women, of lovely forms, arrayed for the ocean
bath in costumes Of which the chief garment
is silk garter. You have thought 1t would
be altogether pleasant to 60 In bathing with
these girls. But the pictures are just as
truthful az they are moral, no more so.
Neither ladies nor the other kind so dress or
undress themselves at the seaside resorts Of
France. You might stay a whole season at
Dieppe or TrGuville without having your
taste gratiiied or your modesty shocked in
that way. Women are there who would SO
exhibit themselves il they dared, and who
do 60 as far as they can, but wicked France,
while it does not wholly prohibit indecent
displays-because il long ago found out twas
useless to do so-is careful that they shall
not be forced upon unwilling eyes or into the
face of innocence, and the law confines to the
Spectacular theatres, the opera balls, Mabille,
the Boulder, and similar and worse places,
the wild caperings of frisky demoiseles in
ballet tights, or with the naughty whirl of
skirts in can-can movement. II is very easy
in France to go where these things are, but
if you do not 60 they will not come after
you. Where the demi-monde ventures
among responsibility 1t behaves itself, or it
gets locked up.
The bathing dress is much the same the
world over, being, however, of late years,
most immodest in America. We exaggerate
oil Nur fa s1,in,,c in, t1,oy, nd ira
have taken the patterns of our bathing
dresses from the pictures aforesaid, from
Ouida's novels, and from what we suppose
the Parisiennes wear. We have cut off the
sleeves and legs, until what is left is little
more than the abbreviated drawers, which
before were never seen outside of the privacy
| of the within-doors swimming schools, and
then only when the sexes are given, their
lessons and have their exercise apart. There
are every season, at Cape May and Long
Branch, women so attired for the water that
if, in France, they ventured forth, they
would receive the stern attention Of the po.
lice. We recall the appearance of young
married lady-a lady admitted to society in
Philadelphia-as she came from her bath
room one noon, at Cape May. She had on
the regulation stage tights from the body of
her dress down, and the body of her dress
fitted her as tightly as the legs, while her
head was adorned with skull-cap of loud
color and trimmings, making her altogether
an object to startle the most experienced
roue. She left nothing whatever to the i'm
agination. She was less clothed than was
ever the Menken as Mazeppa; yet there was
no blush upon her cheek as she gave her
naked arm to the man, (not her husband, }
who went with her into the intimacy of the
surf. This lady would have shuddered at
Al .,.,,
her knee to cross Chestnut street, but she
had no shame in going almost nude into the
presence of hundreds of men, women, and
children, and doing her utmost by her man
ner and the arrangement of the little she did
have on, to advertise her boldness.
Five years ago the feminine arms and legs
| and busts were as carefully kept from view at
the seaside as they were in the cities, for we
had not yet reached the strange conclusion
that there is one standard of modesty for
summer and another for winter. Indeed,
ladies were more modest at the resorts. The
city ball dress was always lavish in its rev.
Citations, while the bathing costume con
cealed everything and suggested nothing, and
even at night for the hop there was not the
reclSlessness Of the town ball dress. To-day
nine women out of ten discard the old-style
bathing costume, and don the new tangled
one, their legs in stockings or tights, and,
occasionally, even without either of these
with no more concern than when, as babes
on their mothers laps, they kicked about
their plump limbs in infantile glee. What
ever of bashfulness still remains to then
they leave on the shore, and in the water are
ready for anything. They mount on mem.
shoulders and dive therefrom, they ART
ducked and hoated and Rugged by fellows o.
whom, not unfrequently, they know nothing
at all, ana to whom they are often introduced
but ten minutes before. II yOn can imagin,
" Black Crook " ballet corps standing oil
their heads, and keeping time to the must,
of" Orphee with their neither extremities
you will agree that they would give fail
duplicate of the scenes presented daily, ovel
and over again, during the fashionable bath
ing hours along the Jersey coast.
The men, too, deserve censure. In their
short bathing dresses they omit stockings
and their Naked red, hairy legs, and the
arms unprotected hy the slightest hint o
sleeves, make them look as II prepared for
prize fight, insteadOf for the close com
panionship of ladies'. Their nndress has no
even the excuse OF beauty. 1t is gross an,
disgusting.
When fitting hoops were in fashion, AM
on fair afternoons on Chestnut street KEEP
up an ever-changng panorama of legs of al
how he liked the mode, replied; First rat
for the sisters of other chaps.' There yo
: have 1t. A woman who conducts herself be
fore men az they would not have their sister
; behave, falls In their respect, and If til
ladies who promenade the sands this sum
mer, dressed like fgurantes in theatre
could hear what is said Of them, We thin
they would recognize their mistake. I'll
!, female bathing costumes of the time ar
|, pretty and becoming and all that, but the
|. are entirely vulgar, and their effect upo
the wearers must be bad. We know ho
= men talk, and We know orr words here al
!, none too strong. A woman cannot in safet
\ accustom herself to such exposures of 1t
. person. It certainly makes her gossippe
!, about and suspected. II must destroy a
: her finer feelings, and it may weaken 1t
= virtue.
. Last week We told OF the difficulties of n
Bath at the seashore for those who sought
y for its real benefits. There is nothing of il
q consistency with what We then said in OF
= present remarks of the methods of the butte
y flies of fashion. Their ways do not Jesse
: the trouble or at all advance the actu
:, worth of the surf bath. -Phiadelphia Spld,
y Mirror.
y Out of my window look,
% And the boys 20 trooping by;
NF.t.. .ala. .laa