St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1886-01-31
ART IN UNDREsS
Travestied by the Extreme TO which
DecOIlete Costumes are Carried.

TraVestied by the Extreme TO Which
DecOIlete Costumes are Carried.
Permit me to enlarge somewhat upon the
subject OF decollete costumes. 1t seems TO
me this is good time to take up this sub
ject, for we have had our attention called
TO it without stint this winter by the ladies
who go to extremes in that style of dress
and who have so favorable an opportunity
to display its charms at the two opera
houses. If one had a desire to make a
closer study of it than the opportunities
furnished by the two opera houses he might
have been amply rewarded for his pains by
going to the Charity and Old Guard balls.
A decollete costume of the extreme order is
thing that can't be described. There was
time when there was such an expression
as low neck and short sleeves" but il has
got far beyond that now. 1t is no longer
question of neck at all, but
QUESTION OF WAIST.
Beloved reader, have you in your mind
an example of extravaganza of fashion
that l am writing about? Perhaps you
have several. What do you think about it?
You must have some opinion, for 1 observe
that extreme cases always excite quiet re-
marks from people who happen to be near
by. Perhaps there are women so inno-
cent, SO absolutely unconscious of the ten
denotes of human nature as to be under the
happy delusion that the average man looks
at the revelations of a decollete dress Just
as he looks at a diamond pin or an ostrich
feather. There may be few sublimated
men of this kind, but they are too scarce
TO be depended on with confidence. The
mass of the human race has not yet pro-
crossed to the point of perfection where
the bar OF modesty may be removed with
safety. The respectable theory of decOl-
lete costume is that it is artistic and beauti-
full, that il satisfies the aesthetic taste; the
other theory is that it appeals 10 the SEN
suality of men. There are
TWO CLASSES OF WOMEN.
who go to extremes in this freak of fashion
the women i'm scarlet and the women in
white. The women in white are followers
of the respectable theory, while the women
in red are the followers of the other-and
both wearing the same sort of costume.
The decollete dressing at the French ball
the other evening was not one whit more
extreme than at either the Charity or the
Old Guard bali, or than that one may see
any night at either of the grand operas.
And yet it was enjoyed from as different
standpoints as those from which waiter
serving dinner and gentleman who eats
the dinner wear evening coats. The ques-
ton l am trying TO reach is whether the ex-
IRENE decollete costume is more consistent
with the theory of the woman in scarlet
than the theory of the woman i'm white. L
gladly admit the motives of the two classes
are as widely apart as the poles of the earth.
but motive does not always protect If it
did, Lady Godiva herself might ride along
the street and excite no more notice or COM
ment than if she were made of brass or mar
bic. There must be a limit somewhere.
Art itself knows no limit in the matter OF
dress; it really has nothing to do with
THE MORAL PHASE OF THE CASE.
A thing may be highly artistic and highly
immoral at the same time and one can
sacrifice good taste and propriety in the
pursuit of the artistic. Innocence and
good motives are a protection so far. and
no further. If in order to fill the require
ments of fashionable dressing n woman
subjects herself to criticism that would
make her cheeks burn like a red-hot coal,
is she not losing more than she gains? In
the first place nine-tenths of the results of
decollete dressing are not artistic. Heaven
preserve us from the kind of art taught us
by most of the women who dress in this
way! Look at the array any night at the
opera. What sort of an artistic dream is
the fat dowager so attired? Art? Art?
Could il be so travestied? The lean
woman is less unfortunate only in that
there is less of it. There Is only one who
can venture on
THIS DEBATABLE GROUND.
She is very young. the very sweet-faced
and innocent young cir of symmetrical
figure in which every lin OF beauty is not
painfully outraged. In her the artistic
dream may be realized. What audacity
and vulgarity and barbarity it is for the
halt. and tn lame and the blind of the sex
to come marching up TO pose for the same
thing? But they come, neverthelesS-come
in brigades, like an invading army, and we
are left TO wonder at the blind faulty of
womanliind in the presence of fashions
arbitrary commands. Ii is my sincere
opinion that the woman in scarlet has the
better of the argument. She has a plain,
distinct, undisguised purpose, and her at
tire is consistent with that purpose. She
has the right, by discovery and appropriate
ness, TO this extremity of dress and the
woman in white ought not to encroach on
her domain. r. Il. in New York World.