Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1889-03-06
A Stubborn Prejudice.

DIFFICULTY ENCOUNTERED IN FORWARDING FE-
MALE DRESS REFORM.
From the Chicago Times.
For some years the intelligent women of the
United States and England have been engaged
in the problem Of diminishing the weight with
out altering the general feminine character
istics of the traditional costume which has ap-
pertained to their half of the human race. The
manishness of DIR. Mary Walker. the ugliness of
the Boomer mode, and the various undisguised
attempts of radicals like the late gallant little
tighter, Jane Gray Swisshelm, to abolish all
distinctions, more or less. have COM
manded no following worthy of mention. The
making woman's attire more conducive to
health and life; secondly to beauty
and grace. 1t is an open secret that
in accomplishing this desirable pur-
pose they have been gradually rejecting the
stays which made Queen Elizabeth look like
high-ribbed Greek trireme; that gave to
Queen Anne the stocky tightness of a Dutch
clipper ship; and which, in our recent times,
created the small bodices and smaller brains
that adorned the little Trianon and fastened
the decheance at Versailles. 1t was time for
rational women whose lives contain other OBJ
jects than the servile worship Of society or the
idle languors of gossipy drawing-rooms to rebel
against modes that are still designed in the
dubois precincts of the boulevards, and whose
most obsequious disciples in England and the
d
not the faintest idea where the fashions come
from.
But every good thing in this world has its
abuses and some good things come to evil
ends. 1t is an open secret now, as one can see
in any modiste's shCw-window or hear in any
talk on sanitary dress, that the numberless
heavy starched petticoats that helped our great
grandmothers keep their huge hoops in place
when Lady Malaprop was Sinking her philo-
sophie parallels to Sir Charles has been seri-
onsly lessened. In fact it is as well to acknowl-
edge that something called a divided skirt
which, not to mention it too loudly, is Turkish
what-do-you-call-e has taken the place of
the fussy and easily-soiled jupons. Ladies wear
this regaiia SO reservedly and SO modestly
wthsl that if its manufacture were not open the
world would still be ignorant of its existence
But alas, what fate befell Mrs. Lizzie Ryan at
Hannibal!
If her neighbor should wear her divided skirt
under her dress, why should she not wear hers
over it? She was farmer in Kansas. Tramps
frequently invaded her premises. Her woman q
costume invited their cowardly instincts to rob
and piilage. She wrote to the judicial officer
of her county, and told him that change of
clothes on her part would effect change of
conduct on theirs. He replied with good sense
that she had right to dress as she pleased
especially for the defense of her home. She
put her divided skirt on outside. and thereafter
was not troubled in her estate, either personal
or real. But one day Dame Ryan bethought
her she would go to Hannibal. As Rosalind
tremblingly warned Celie it were dangerous
thing. as dangerous as the forest of Arden
but Lizzie felt no fear. She did not place
gallant curte AK upon her thigh, q
gosr-spear in her hand; nor did she take on ''a
smashing and martial outside, as many other
mannish towards have" She went up quietly
to Hannibal, and as soon as her strange cos
tune was seen by the police, with the spirit Of
some of their Chicago brethren, they put the
virtuous and astonished dame inside the jail for
shocking of their modesty.
Dame Ryan should ask for writ of habeas
corpus returnable before any one of half a
dozen Chicago judges. They would vindicate
her right to dress as she pleased so long as il
was modest, and her arresters would be sent to
the bastile to serve out the remainder Of her
sentence-for a Dogberry actually treated her
as misdemeanant. This is a case in which the
Women's protective agency might extend its
Jurisdiction with propristy and effect.
Cure for Sleeplessness.
From the Toledo Blade.
Twas talking with very convivial friend. .
major, about the rev remedy to produce sleep.
'Sulphurial"
Don't talk that to me, sab, don't talk any of
your new-fangled beverages to me, sah," said
he, Il won't hear OF them at all, sab, at ALL
These new patent medicines are the curse of
the race, sab. Why are we, as q people, de-
terioratins, sab? Why? Simply because We
axe oosllS OURSELVES WIN every drug We can
lay our hands ON, old or new. Why, sab, il d
appalling to contemplate"
do You ever want to sleep, msjor, when you
can't?" asked.
"Of course, Of course, sah."
swell, what do you do?"
"whst do I do? You blamed idiot, what
would any man with brain do? Why, when
want to sleep, and feel 20 wide awake that I
could 60 ont and read in the dark, 60 take .
| good long drink Of my customary beverages, sah.
You know what that 4. Then, sah, IL that nils,
90 take anothah. II that does mot kin down
my eyelids 60 and take two. II Morpheus re-
fuses to lock me in his arms, 20 and Ake three
more, and by that time don't care . conti-
mental darn whether ever 60 70 deep o. nokr
In Az nliaois ao.ake !. hfll h>n honn S.Sue-