Delaware state journal. [volume] (Wilmington, Del.) 1870-1883, 1881-06-23
OUR LETTER FROM BOSTON
.sSM4SHING, 4 MASTER or HORSE
THE s SUNSHINE OFSMILES.
A Boston Riding School - Riding
Habiss-FashfOns in GeneraI-The
TOurieaus.


Special Correspondence Of state Journal
BosToy June 15.-Arabellatoo lesson
in euuestrianism the other day. We went
to the riding school, ascertaiued in the
office that "the man" was up stairs, and
wended our way upwards to the ladies'
dressing room, where we found long
cloth skirt hanging on nail, which my
friend proceeded to don, having divested
herself of the tounced and shirred stylish
arrangement of silk and satin and jet
which she had worn in the street. Then
we went down flight to the ring where
there was solitary man sprinkling the
tan-covered floor, the very gruffest, most
uncompromising sort of man that | ever
saw. He ordered the horse up, aud
assisted Arabella to mount and then left
her to her own devices. Finally she
ventured to ask him something, after her
horse had wandered around the ring two
or three times at his own sweet will, and
then the man said
"Oh do you want lessoni Thought
YOU wanted an exercise ride"
Fancy anyone so crazy as to go career
ing around in that stuffy place for sex
ercise" when all outdoors was open to one:
Yes, she wanted lesson. So the
man ordered up his horse. | went and
whispered to Arabella;
"Snub that man, my dear He is
nsutferable."
"No, my dear" said she, "Ill smash
him instead. If | don't succeed in that,
you shall snub him. He is intolerable !"
That was according to our old compact;
she to do the ''smashing,n l to do the
snubbing. But, as usual, she smashed.
To watch the way in which that cross,
ugly old fellow thawed and wilted into
kindly good nature under the influence
of few sweet smiles and respectful
words, was a study that interested me
immensely, and that proved once more in
this worlds history the power of gentle
word. And it is to point this moral that
| adorn my letter with the riding lesson.
Nevertheless, there Is another object.
Fashion rules horseback riding as it does
everything else. Fashion says now that
the long floT of skirt which ladies used
to wear is supplanted by skirt just
barely long enough to cover the stirrup
foot Sensible, this, for many a horse
has been startled by sudden flap of his
wearers skirt, and has thrown her and
the skirt off his back in twink
ling. Fashion also says that
the skirt-the whole habit-muGt be
fitted and made by a tailor who devotes
himself specially to the manufacture of
these garments, and quite as much care
and pains is expended in the cutting, fit
ting, shrinking and pressing of these
shirts, as in the making of masculine
trousers. Just Ss the latter garments are
so manipulated with sponge and tailor's
goose that they shall not bag at the outer
bend of the knees, or wrinkle too badly
L l.. - Oh. .-t
differently made on the two sides, the
right side being so cut and shrunk as to
| fit the wearer's position when seated III
| the saddle, and the left side being left
more full and easy. The basque of the
habit has altered very little, but the hat
| need no longer be the tall and
uncomfortable silk one. Very many
ladies wear the pretty Derby,
but the most graceful and COM
Portable is some soft velvet cap.
| Arabella's favorite, when mounted On
Gypsy" is the black velvet "Tam
| O'Shanter" which she bought in London
last summer. 1t is odd but one point of
difference between English and American
fashions is so illustrated here that | must
refer to it.. The Tam O'Shanter cap, o
which you may remember that | wrote
you when | first returned from abroad
last September, was distinctively ali
English and not French style. In six
weeks after my return they became COM
mon enough here, but with what differ
ence So altered, so entirely changed by
manipulation and by trimming that the
entire character of the cap was lost, and
it was anything but pretty or
pleasing or becoming. In London
the cap was plain and simple,
depending for its style on the jaunty way
in which it was put on, and on its very
simplicity, being either entirely devoid
of any trimming, or with 4 single curling
ostrich plume dropping down at one side.
We are queer people, as cosmopolitan
in our dress as in our nationalities and
the worst of it is, that in the one as in
the other We mix the Characteristic
features of different peoples and different
methods of dress all up into one conglom-
crate compound, oftentimes with results
far more disastrous than was that of the
famous thinking up of Little Buttercup.
French fashions have to be Americanized
before being sent across the
water. If English fashions come
over, pure and simple, they get
Americanized about as soon as they reach
us. The French and the English are
consequently commingled by some enter
prising artist () on this side, determined
to produce novel effects (and usually sue
seeding too well y Then New York
styles-for it is in New York that this
Babel-lille confusion takes place-have
to be Bostonized before the Hub will adopt
them. The process of Bostonizing is a
queer mingling OF toning down and toning
up; of compromising with some startling
} new fashion by introducing it in the guise
Of some six months old one. Boston prides
itself ON two things. That it won't adopt
, New York fashions just as they come from
New York, because the latter city is loud
and pronounced and the Hub is quiet, re-
fined and aesthetic, and that, if it chooses,
; it will wear Just exactly what it pleases,
anyhow, whether it is in fashion or out,
or has never been in or out at all; because
Boston has good taste and cannot go far
astray and because of all things of to-day
the very finest thing is to be elegantly
independent and Independently elegant.
Talking of New York, reminds me that
| am going on to the great metropolis
! the great whitehall glaring city of dis
tances, the Paris of America-the last OF
the week, to ''see Of the Tourjeans as
they sail for Europe, and will write you
of the styles as find them there. One
: party of rourjeans sailed last Saturday
) for, as usual, the main party for next
, Saturday was filed early, and the after
u comers were obliged to "spill over" onto
, another date. The prospect in every way
promises splendid summer abroad foi
those who are so fortunate as to be of The
: party. met yesterday young gentle
: man of San Francisco, who is student a
!, the Boston University Law School, anC
who goes with next Saturdays party
He had the uncertain, excited, represset
sort of an air about him which every
body has when about to sail out on tn
= great waters and to the strange unknown
lands beyond for the first time. 1t i
y certainly u great event in anybody's lif
t. to make the first trip away from the Con
II tinent on which he was born to the othe
'e side Of the world. ROBIN.
$, Still Another Version.
y The New York correspondent sof TIL
d Philadelphia Ledger, writing under dat