The progressive farmer. [volume] (Winston, N.C.) 1886-1904, 1895-04-16
osTENTATIoN.

correspondence VI liz IIOBICSo4NO hIu4OE
Ostentation is older than civilization;
ancient as the primeval savage. The
desire to appear Drawer, handsomer,
richer, stronger, better or worse, and
so on, than others, or than we really
are, has been a universal failing from
remotest times, and ever attended with
unhappy consequences. However, we
shall not here attempt to attack all
forms Of vanity, but would draw atten
tion to that particular one of vain show
which is the more general mode of o.
tentation. The Latin ''ostentare, "
means to show often in a boasting
manner. Anything, therefore, which
is done from vulgar pride to dazzle
others, is of this character. And it
would seem as if all changes of fashion
prompted by vanity are SO many marks
of this failing, for these r at first
adopted by the rich, and by them for
saken as soon as they become common.
An old French moralist, declining in
1885 against the prevailing fashions,
and especially that of ladies carrying
mirrors SO that they might constantly
view themselves, notices this course Of
human frailty. "Alas!" he said, Sin
what an age do we live, to see such de-
pravity as we see; that induces them
even to bring into church those scan
dalous mirrors hanging about their
waists. Let all histories, divine, human
and profane, be consulted; never will
it be found that these objects Of vanity
were aver thus brought into public by
the most meretricious of the sex. 1t
is true, at present, none but the ladies
of the Court venture to wear them but
long it will not be before every citizens
daughter, and every female servant
will have them!'
Nothing is more ludicrous than the
origin of these extravagances. In Ed
ward Wis time, a lady with a wen on
her neck covered it by patch. From
that time patches became the mode. A
hundred years later they were cut into
all kinds Of fantastic figures: owls,
rings, suns, moons, and even a coach
and horses. A dauphin of France had
a high shoulder. This gave rise to
full bottomed" wigs Long coats were
invented to hide the ill made" legs of
Charles the Seventh of Franch, and
pointed shoes a yard long to conceal an
-excrescence ON the foot of Henry Plan
tagenet of Anjou. When the Arch
duchess Isabella wore the anne dirty
linen for three years because she had
vowed not to change it until Ostend
was taken, its color at the end of that
time became fashionable as LISA
beau" a dingy-whitish yellow. An
other Isabella, she of Bavaria, noted
for her fair complexion and her frail
duct, introduced the fashion of having
the shoulders and neck uncovered. The
whims of fashion are shown by a print
of Henry VILE time, representing a
nude Englishman holding a piece of
cloth on his right arm and a pair of
shears in his left hand, and bears this
inscription:
L Gil Oil GuBLA5uulduy III L SOdu4 uSE
Musing in my mind what ratment l shall were;
For now [ will were this, and now l will were
that,
And now will were what I cannot tell what"
Down to the reign of William and
Mary, little children of the upper
classes wore wigs, but BARRIERS had not
then become hair dressers. These were
women Verify 'sthere is no new thing
under the SUM-"
Comft boxes were great signs Of ~es-
tentation, and were the rage in France
before snuf-boxes took their place. All
carried them on all occasions, and when
the Duke of Guiss was shot at Blois his
comft- box was found in his hand.
Chaucer's "Persones Tale in the chap
ter DE Superbia," tells, as we dare not,
to what lengths pride and improperly
in dress were carried in his day, par
ticularly by the men. In France it was
bad enough. A modest Italian could
not travel there in the 18th century,
said an Italian author, without being
shocked by seeing men 'Whose clothes
rather exposed their nakedness than
hid it." But in England it was after
wards worse, and our countrymen
gloried in their shame.
The Queen of Charles III. introduced
the immodest custom of completely
barring the bosom and shoulder. But
this was the reign of harlotry and
RIGHTEOUSNESS. Good old Richard Bax-
ter thought it necessary to write the
preface for a book called "a Just and
Seasonable Reprehension of Naked
Breasts and Shoulders" A later work
on the same topic, "New Instructions