The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1890-11-13

OEC0 W
ITO trace the development from their
primitive origin of women's garments as
they are worn today is very easy" said
Professor Mason at the National museum
You can see the original Of the petticoat
even now among savage peoples all over
he world in the shape of the universal
waist cincture, with pendent drapery Of
bark or what not.
"The most beautiful illustration of this
IS to be found at present among the Indians
# the northwest coast. The female among
those tribes ties cord around her waist
and hangs therefrom innumerable strings
Of shells, beads, pine nuts and all sorts of
things that are pretty and make a jingle.
So sacred are these ornamental girdles
considered that when the girls join the
white schools and are Obliged to adopt civ
ilized clothing it is very usual for them to
wear the garments under their skirts be-
hind, doubled up. Many authorities aver
that this is actually the source from which
the notion of the hustle was derived.
'The ciucture | have described reaches
only from the waist to the middle of the
thigh. As to the upper part of the body
the Indian maiden of the northwest wears
nothing for a covering, except in cold
weather, when she puts on the tanned skin
of some beast, simply tying it over the
windward shoulder and under the other
arm with strings. Thus you have an ad-
mirable example of the most primitive fe-
male costume. The next step in the de-
velopment of the upper garment is made
by cutting holes through the skin to &C
cOmmOdaUe the arms, and IN this shape
you find the primitive and earliest form Of
jacket.
AMONG THE PoLYNEsIANs.
"Take a big jump over to the islands of
the Pacific and you find the savages max
ing clothing for themselves out of null
berry bark, which they beat with mallets
and wash until all the soft part of it's sub
stance has been taken out of it, leaving the
textile portion, which serves in that shape
for a soft and strong cloth. A piece of
any size can be made by hammering the
edges OF many pieces together until they
unite so perfectly that it is difficult to find
where they join.
at is believed that the largest piece of
this mulberry cloth in the world is at
present in the National museum; it is six
feet long by twenty feet wide. Among
the rich islanders it is the custom for a
woman to wrap as much as thirty or forty
yards Of the stuff around the body, below
the breasts, which are left exposed. The
simple lengthening of the primitive waist
garment makes the petticoat as we find
it today.
"As for the jacket, its most primitive
form was that of skin tied over the shout
ders. Next the skin became blanket,
or1 hi ba o,,f
through the middle of the blanket, as in
the Mexican cloak called the 'poncho.'
You will find the Arabs even now employ
ing the same device, with Ike addition of
holes for the arms. By the time you have
got this far the jacket is pretty nearly COM
plete. All it needs TO become entire are
sleeves and cutting to the figure.
ORIGIN OF CoRsETs.
"Corsets have always been worn in one
shape or another by people who were at all
civilized, the necessity for some support
for the bust being obviously the occasion
for them, and not fashion, to begin with.
Women of ancient Greece and Rome wore
cloth bandage wrapped about the body,
more or less tightly, beneath the bosom
for the purpose In the time of Queen
Elizabeth the corset, as you are doubtless
aware, was a far more formidable thing
than it is now, in stiffness and size almost
like a piece Of armor. Nowadays women
wear corsets because they make their fig
ures shapely, and that reason is sufficient
to constitute q certainty that they will go
on doing so for an indefinite time
"As for stockings, you know yourself
they are of the most modern invention, as
may be judged from the fact that Queen
Elizabeth was censured for her extrava-
gance in procuring few pairs of silk stock
ings for her own use. To discover the orr
gin of the stocking you have only to con-
slider the fact that the people in early
times, finding the simple sandal not very
comfortable, wore it as sole for soft
foot covering separate from it, which was
the first attempt at luxury in footwear.
You can see that it was only necessary to
stitch the sandal to the soft shoe in order
to make what was to all intents and pur-
poses the shoe of the present day. But the
men of those early times found it con
venient to wear for hunting purposes leg
gings to protect their limbs from the
thorns and burrs. Hence have been devel-
oped what we know as breeches or trousers.
Recently there has reached the museum a
pair OF ancient leggings of the sort de
scribed attached by sewing TO the soft
UndersOles. Here you have what is doubt
less the original form Of stocking.
NATURAL HISTORY OF RIBBONS
Nothing is more closely identified with
women dress today than ribbons. What,
then, is the origin Of ribbons' You can
discover it very simply by looking at the
long fringe Of strips into which the Primi
tive savage cuts the deer hide or other
skins that forms MS garment or his to-
bacco pouch or whatever else Of his orna-
mental possessions you please. Why does
the savage 90 to the trouble of cutting the
beasts hide into such strips' 1t is because
the eye is pleased with waving curves.
When savage fashions merged into civil
lzed fashions this idea was retained, and
so at present we find weave-s ard makers
of srutTs manufacturing their fabrics into
what we call ribbons They are adopted
peculiarly by women IN this age, when the
masculine sex eschews ornament in civil
lied life almost wholly.
''The hat, in its origin, is thing purely
ornamental Except in arctic chimes,
where as much as possible Of the body
must be covered to keep out the cold, saw
ages have never thought Of protecting the
head With us il is a matter purely Of cul-
tivatiOn-the necessity for a head covering
growing ont OF the habit Of employing il
The beginning Of the hat was what you
find 1t among savage peoples tocAy-s tuft |
Of feathers, a bunch Of porcupine quills or
what not. Washington SIAr.
Fr1orrIn- Ten Murh.