The Springdale news., 1889-12-13
OUTFITS FOR INFANTS.
One of the 0ueerest shopping Places In
 New York City.

New 1ork tlty.
 It is interesting to a man to loiter for half an hour or so in a fashionable dry goods store and watch women shop, but it is much more interesting to stand for awhile in shop where nothing is sold except for children and to observe how mothers and elder sisters buy things for their younger charges. There is shop in this town where you may buy every thing that girl will ever need in the way of apparel. from the day she is born until she reaches the stature of young womanhood. Or, if it's boy, you may purchase all his clothes-every thing he will ever wear from the hour he comes into the world until he is seventeen or eighteen years of age.
 This shop is said to be the only one -oT the sort in the United States, or in all the world except in London and perhaps in Paris. The business began in small way here some time within the present decade, and now has be- come so great that takes all the space in two large buildings and an annex to hold the stock and afford salesrooms. Half an hour in this place is to bach eior time of odd sights. The first thing that impresses is the extent of the establishment. There is floor upon floor. each filled with goods solely for children. The next thing noticeable f ho 1op of hnh nd throughout the place. Doting mothers have brought them, sometimes in their own care, sometimes in the care of nurses, sometimes in the care of older children. The shopping is all for the benefit of the youngsters. but the youngster doesn't have much to say about it. The mother and her el- der daughter will put the baby on the floor or on the counter, and then busy themselves studying goods or gar ments. Generally only those children are put on the floor who can walk, and so while the elders are examining arti- eles and searching for just what they want. it often happens that the young ster will wander off to some other spot an the big room. It is odd to see the little ones toddle off on their own hook to some pile of cloaks, and began pull ing at them as if they wanted to do some shopping on their own account. Authorities in the store say that boy babies show just as much desire to look at things as do the girl babies, all of which goes 10 prove that boys might become as good shoppers as girls il they only had q long enough chance.
 There is heap of fun in watching one child wander away from it's mother and strike up an acquaintance with some other child that has slipped off from its maternal skirts. Baby A gets within handshaking distance of Baby E, and the two look inquiringly at each other They can't talk very yolubly, but there is a language in glances and gestures and grunts ineligible to them, if not to a bachelor observer Fhe youngsters look each other all over aud, if they seem to be mutually at Lracted, they come closer together, and one will stretch out it's short arm and unfold a chubby fist on the shoulder of the other, as if to make sure it is real flesh and blood beneath the cloak upon which the unfolded fist lies. Then the second baby will feel of the first in like manner, and the next minute the two are hugging each other and soon are 3own on the floor smuggling close to each other, and trying to tell each other all they know and all they think about this place.
 But there is more fun when the mothers having come to some sort of a decision about what they should buy. look around for the youngsters of whose wanderings they have been ig- noraut. Every ten minutes or so there is to be seen mother walking rapidly the salesroom, glancing down now at this group of babies and then at that, and finally finding her own strayed away darling. Then the child is trotted back to the counter and the trying on process begins. The child's light wrap is taken off and one of heavier stuff for winter weather is put on. The youngster is stood off at distance, and the mother studies the effect. The garment doesn't fit. she thinks, and then another and another are tried. Frequently the child has an idea it ought to have something to say about the selection itself, and it will hutter of to mirror and see how things look to its own eyes. There is a similar show when they have the tyrants try on their lili- putian shoes or their brobdingnagian hats, and, altogether tie shopping in such a place is about as queer as any in Gotham. |. Sun.
 Prof. C. had gone to spend the