The Mena weekly star., 1896-09-16
HEATED LONDON.
The English Always Taken by Surprise
 with High Temperature.

The English Always Taken by Surprise
 with High Temperature.
 The curious thing is, as far as con- eerns the people of this country, that 8 warm summer always takes them by surprise. It catches them in the na- tional costume, which is absolutely the worst fitted in the world for a spell of really hot weather. The tall silk top per. the frock coat and the dark, con- straining trousers - what miserable sbominations are these to wear in dog days compared with almost any other garments worn in almost any other lands where the sun shines. The arti- sans and the worlman's dress is little better suited to hot spell than that of the professional man or London loung- CT; but at least these can fling aside coat or jacket and work in their shirt sleeves. Roasted out of conservatism by the thermometers, 6 few bold spirits do, indeed, under present circum- stances, discard altogether the super huous waistcoat, and go about fearless ly with a sill<en cummerbund around the waist, straw hat or white cap on the head, and the neck judiciously freed from starched collar and stiff crayat. Yet their number is comparatively few. There were only five white hats worn at the queens recent garden party, and the streets have been rife with the ridiculous sight of citizens who hold their chimney-pot of tight and torrid silk in one hand, while with the other they mop fevered brow, and furtively unbutton too rigid waisteoat and trousers band.
 Stolid and perspiring, the hapless police of the metropolis go about all these fiery days in their dark and hot blue tunics. Not so much as the dis tant idea of a possible summer time seems ever to have entered the minds of those who clothe these faithful serv- ants of the public. Nay, the public it. self-as we have said-confronts the hot weather with sort of stupid as- tonishment, wearing the same articles and style of garb which suited winter and early spring, but which become outrageous, absurd and intolerable in the tropical moons which year after year now glow and glitter in our once temperate zone. The female portion of the population displays more courage and good sense. In muslins and cam brics, i'll cool, pretty prints and fiutter- ing blouses of silk and satin, the wom- en set charming example to the black coated, sillS-hatted, tight-buttoned half of the community. Meanwhile, the wretched, conventional, tortured, ridic- ulous man goes on enduring the agony of his black broadcloth, the anguish of his silk hat, the horror of his starched shirt collar, and the penalty of his pointed patent-leather boots as if the thermometer did not cnjoin upon him to be wiser.
 In the east. where summer and winter dress are always rational, 1t is easy to be temperate. The body, lightly and pleasantly clad, takes as a blessing, not provocation, the glorious golden weather. The precipitation, continu- ous but insensible, produces only a light thirst, readily quenched by the delicate and simple beverages of the In- dian sherbet shop or the Japanese tea house. But here, in these burning Eng fish summers, the BriVon, cased in ugly and unreasonable garments, provokes a desudation which leads to thirst, fierce, uncomfortable, imperious, so that he actually manufactures his own mis- cry and demoralization. If Sir Wilfrid Lawson wants to strike a real blow at intemperance let him assail the top hat, the frock coat and the cloth dress in summer. Diana would be a draggle tail and Apollo be run in for taking too much nectar if they wore the usual London clothes in q London July.-Lon- don Telegraph.