Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1889-11-10
WAR UPON CONVENTIONAL MOURNING

A vigorous movement is on foot In Eng
land, and has already happily been felt in
the United States, to work the abandon
ment of the practice Of wearing mourning.
As against it the sanitarians prove that
Grape is about the most unhealthful fabric
that one can put upon the body. In fact,
it is in proof that the widows veil has
sent widows to the grave as tenants of the
last cell The dye in the Grape is very in
furious, and at times has brought on dis
eases of the skin that have defed medical
science. Every woman knows what the
stain of damp Grape means, how quickly
it sinks into the skin, and how difficult it
is of removal. The mourning garb, by its
fashion, is the enemy of exercise and free
movement. Conventional rules require
that it should be clinging, and this i'm
pedes the movement of the limbs. But the
moral effect of the black and doleful drap-
ing is the chief evil, since it is depressing
in effect upon the wearer, and all who
come into contact with it. 1t casts the
shadow of gloom deep over the household !;
it keeps the grave in the home; it chills
the lives of the young and the hopeful.
Since all must die; since death is the
natural and inevitable end of all Of US,
why should the living have more than the
hearts share of the joys of life laid upon
the altar of regret? Why should the
women alone be isolated from even their
families, by the ungraceful and unhealth-
full garb, that fashion DEGREES, to signify to
the world the depth of the wearer's woe ?
Lady Habberton- has headed a move
ment in the mother country for the aban-
donment of mourning, and has in a sharp,
direct and forcible paper given reasons for
her crusade that are all but unanswerable.
The only possible response to her, is that
sentiment demands the exposition of in
ward sorrow by the outward manifestation.
But woes consequent upon death of the
loved are sacred sorrows. and the griefs of
the ireside, and should no more, in reason,
be paraded, than one should promenade
the streets with any other regalia indica-
tive of any other mental state.
Aside from the fact that Grape veil over
the face furnishes minute poisonous par
ticles to be taken into the lungs by every
inspiration, it is but an arbitrary custom,
and that cannot be traced back to reason,
since some peoples mourn in white raj
ment. The Society of Quakers does not
permit its members to don the black for
mourning, and no one charges them with
insensibility to grief.
Lady Habberton says:
If precedent is needed, it is pleasant to know
that it already exists and to realize the fact that
scores of calm-browed, earneSt-hearted nine
tenth century women have not needed mourn
ing as a protection or means OF expression in
the hour of attiiction. Grief would seem to be a
personal affair, sacred 10 the individual, need
ing no outward sign of its having taken the
world into its confidence, and having thus cast
something of a shade over the joy of living-said
Joy not being an inexhaustible mine in any
community. Rather is the stock in perpetual
need OF increase.
And the Medical Journal, which has
taken up the cudgels in defense of the
leader of the revolt against moral and
physical malefcence of gloomy garments
which "absorb so much domestic ozone"
well says:
Such unwise fashions tend to stultify the
wonderfully recuperative, powers OF time and
nature. Hugging grief to keep itwarm is poor
business, and so is the worship of sorrow.
Speed the day when it shall be considered I'M
becoming to wipe our eyes upon the public or to
All that Diogenes asked of Alexander was that
the King should stand out of his sunshine. And
we all have right to demand of society that it
take its mourning out of humanity's sunshine,