The Indianapolis journal., 1890-05-11
LONDON WOMEN.

How They Paint and Powder and Otherwise
"Make Up"-Testimony Of Native Critic.
Letter In Boston Herald.
Few English women retain their personal
charms as they grow old; many American
women not only retain them but permit
nature TO increase them. What the English
woman lacks, and what nature will not do
art. And she does not wait until she has
passed the heydey of youth before she en-
lists the offices of brush and pigment.
powder and rogue. 1t is the fashion. or. at
any rate. the practice, for London women to
paint and powder from their necks to the
very summits of their foreheads. At the
dance and the dinner. at the concert and
the play, nine-tenths of the women are
made up." as if they were about to go in
irons i one on eny fra% the clarinS STAG wifbont
taking the precaution to wash their faces
before presenting themselves to their
friends. They paint by day. and they paint
by night. You see then, in the park, frizzed
and colored to the last degree. In America
we would say these women were burlesque
actresses who had somehow strayed from
the green-roon:, or we might apply to them
some less kindly description. At any rate.
We should cali them m last Bat The the LoIa or
respectable British matrons. persons OF
quality" and sweet debutantes OF the
season.
OF course some worthy citizen, or equally
worthy subject, will Immediately proclaim
the falsity of the foregoing paragraph.
When he has ceased his clamorI will call
up0n the lady who writes the "Boudo1r
Gossip for that admirable weekly, the
Ladies' Pictorial, and we will hear what
she has to say in the matter. As 1t is the
business of this fair scrivener to indite
each week two pages of diverting remark
upon the royal family. the nobility and
gentry, and the fashions of the hour. and
as her notes appear each Saturday in the
which have already given the name, 1t is
fair to assume that she will make o credible
witness.
Miranda" says in q recent number of
her journal-for the benefit of the skeptics
the date March !, 1890. is here put forth
Miranda" says: Il wish some man in So
ciety whose name carries weight would
take up the delicate matter of making up
/ confess it is painful to me when l go to an
at home,' dance or reception to see the
numbers of women who appear with dyed
hair, painted faces and made-up eyes. And
it is not always women who are past their
first youth who have recourse to this bane-
full and hideous custom l see girls who
ought to rejoice in their youth and fresh
ness just as a Young man rejOices in his
strength, with paint and powder laid
oD in the most clumsy fashion
and piled up hair of two colors.
of this degradation of our sexf The word
is a strong one, but use IL deliberately. /
am inclined to lay the blame on men.
Either they do not care to speak out boldly
ii they 6isapprove. or they take a secret
and malign pleasure in seeing women make
fools of themselves by O public display of
their vanity and weakness. There are in
society men so popular and so sought after
by women that one word of condemnation
from them would, believe, make a clean
sweep of all the paint-p0ts and other
denominations of the kind from hundred
toilet tables. But men seem to delight In
looking unutterable things into made-up
eyes, in ignoring the showers of powder
that fall upon their shoulders in the dance,
and in paying compliments to the complex
ion which they know only to we'll will not
wash"
Thus Miranda" Does she not draw a
drawn. Miranda however, states the
case even more strongly than had done.
She brings the men into the muddle, and
the figures they cut are quite as sorry as
those of tho women. But have not the
London women come to q pretty pass when
they rely upon popular men" to admonish
them of their follyf Yet to "Miranda's"
testimony will append this: 1t is an event
worthy of note and praise when one sees
in good society" here in London an un-
painted female face. and neat, orderly
dressing of female hair that belongs to the
wearer and has not been purchased at the
perruquier's. When you see such a clean
face and such neat head-dress You may.
surely conclude that it belongs to an Amer
lean woman, if it is not the property of an
English girl who has attained to a wisdom
greater than that enjoyed by nine-tenths OF