The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1890-10-19
QUAINT DUTCH COSTUMES
DRESS AS SHE Is WORN IN THE
Low COUNTRIES.

Springs.
tCoBwightl
AMSTERDAM, Oct 10.-rhe broad canal
winds sluggishly through the rank grass
lands, and the trees silently drop yellow
leaves upon its stream. The round towers
of the windmills zig-zag across the land
scape, their huge sails turning with slow
dignity, the thatch and tiles of their roofs
blending in black and gray tones. Here the
narrow fronts and quaint gables of a vii
lege hang upon the waters edge, and chill
dren bend over the wattled, twig-woven
banks floating for boats their wooden shoes;
there long-legged stork rises from among
the feeding cattle and solitary farm
house lifting its high black top above a
thicket Of willows is the only sign of human
activity to break the monotonous scene.
The draw boat (treckschuiD has not
many passengers and the tow rope lazilv
Says in the PUSHES The horse on the tow
path joys along leisurely; the short, square,
set, stolid fellow who rides him sits side
wise. woman-fashion, pipe in mouth. white
painted shoes dangling. But now we passed
a barge like our own, a round-shouldered
skipper at the tiller, peasant woman and
1Ouuk XII
A fellow voyager unfolds her lunch from
handkerchief. The little, round white
dried fish need a good deal OF preparation.
She takes scissors from her pocket and clips
from one and then another the fins and the
tail. Then she removes the skins, a small
black dog watching anxiously for each
waste particle. AIS . y belief, meUroutU"
Of you please. madame), she says, offering a
share of the almost transparent Dutch
10. n e., -
plainly my curiosity. She has bread with
her and bottle of beer. | take her to be
a FrIeslander from her metal skull cap,
which lies close to her temples and
shines with the 81 cam of silver gilt
through the meshes or the lace cap which
covers 1t. Above each ear projects a large
spiral ornament of gold. As we drift
through the bazy October sunshine | com
pare the great twists mentally with the
springs OF bed, and wonder at the resem-
blance. She wears a short dark blue skirt
and black apron. She has a shoulder
shawl in black aud purple folded across her
bosom. She belongs very evidently, in
spite of her headdress, TO tie peasantry,
and not to its well-to-do section. l remem-
Der hearing that ornaments of considerable
cost are still handed down among the moro
primitive country people from mother to
daughter as heirlooms. Vaguely resolve
when the lotus eating spell of canal-boat
life shall be off me to ask about these things
In few spots east of Russia, GU side of the
Black forest, and especially of Holland, are
the picturesque peasants costumes still worn
simply and without self-consciousness, as in
the days before fashion became oosmopoli-
tan. The Italian peasant looks at life from
the models standpoint, and the Swiss has an
eye to tourists and the profits to be made
from them, Just as the Scotch Highlander
IL 4
happens TO be looking for employment as
guide or sees some way in which, with the
autumn visitors, kits may advantage him,
so the pension keeper at Lauterbrunnen, or
even in the remoter Alpine valleys,i is clothed
much ike the wife of a non-prosperous
American farmer throughout the winter,
but when the SHOWS melt and dollars won in
Chicago pork or Nevada silver loom up in
immediate and glorious perspective, then
she brings out cheerily her black velvet
laced bodice and her snowy white chemisette
with its stiffiy starched wing sleeves. From
their hidden recesses she fetches silver
chains to clasp in front and behind, dang
ling under each arm. Then she takes her lace
cushion or her bobbins and sits in the door
way of her chalet-lke cottage, and the
wandering Kansas City maid and Hhiladel-
phia matron says behold here is local
color" and the pension is filed.
There are few Swiss villages so destitute
of enterprise as not to include the studio of
a photographer who supplies gratuitement
peasant costumes in which the yonng
American or English woman can have her
self pictured. So violent is the craze when
1t seizes b stonian that several parties OF
usually correct and conventional Yonng
women from the Hub have been making all
their mountain ascents this summer clad in
the garb of Cantons Valais and Uri Miss
Schreiner, too, who was reigning belle of
McAllsterville last winter, was seen on the
Righi at sunset one day in September lean
ing on an alpenstock and wearing the dress
o. Canton Tug.
But If Swiss costume Is taking the charac-
ter of a stage property" it is different in
the Schwarzwald. Among the fragrant
pine woods of the Black Forest few of the
Younger women wear the dress of their
foremothers, but the midde-aged and ED
erly danes TO whom it has still dignity,
almost pathetic, in view of its approaching
disappearance. put on their black petticoatS,
their short-waisted green bodices and their
broad brimmed straw hats adorned with
black and red rosettes or their quaint black
caps with projecting flaps at the sides on
holidays or when they go funeral It IS
their best and to them has come no thought
of disloyalty.
| wonder can any philosopher answer me
WhY. since women are reputed the creatures
of whim and fancy, changing their clothes
with every season, the old costumes survive
in so many instances with them, while the
corresponding dress of the men has entirely
disappeared. One still sees now and then a
black coat lined with red about Nieder-
wasser or in some of the Black Forest viii
lagos, but in German Lorraine, where even
in Strasburg and Metz the market women
have not abandoned their Tapping head
dresses of broad black ribbons, there is
nothing to distinguish their husbands and
brothers from Frenchmen and Britons.
So it is IN Holland. In the northern prov
inces, outside of the cities, women Of the
seventeenth century walk by the canal
sides with men Of the year Of our Lord 1890.
Even 10 this land of quaintness old things
are passing away. At The Hague last week
[ rum naged in vain to find a child's book
with pictures of Dutch boys and girls The
roly-poly little Netherlanders learn their
nonsense verses out Of picture books Illus
trated with figures Of small Parisians. Yet
the little Netherlanders themselves are
much more interesting 1t was on the
island Of Marker in the Zuyder Zee that
asked one day for "brood en- kaas" dread
and cheese) at the door Of fisherman's cot
tage. In the shining little kitchen woman
was hushing child OF or years.
''Ik sci err tot Jap.
TX sci er tot Jap.
TX sci err tot Jaapie, sta still
En- warrom won liz stle stan
Tx heb van me leyen geen gwaadd gedaan'
TX sci er tot Jaapje; sta stiilf