The herald., 1896-11-29

of hiking girls, and if one of these is de-
tected in the act of consuming an oyster
stew or Il plate oil ice cream Ill the COM
pany of Il Young man the report is en-
tered in the book of evidence. IL a blk
ing girl is discovered smoking a cigar
ette, the crime is photographed on the
spot and an elaborate account of the
villainy turned in at headquarters. No
words in the feeble vocabulary of the
writer can picture the detailed horrors
contained in a report which dealt with
a case when young man was discov-
cred with his arm around the waist of
his companion as the two wheeled along
in the full glare of the electric light on
the Boulevard.
1t seems strange that in view of all
this care there should be just as many
short skirts and bloomers on view as
there were six months ago, but it is the
truth
Miss Smith started the decollete gown
crusade for this season just before the
horse show opened, when she drew some
dreadful word pictures of the wicked
ness of the fashion. Unfortunately for
the industrious crusader. her knowledge
of the horse show was limited other
wise she would have know that the New
Iork woman never attends that func-
tion in a low-cut gown, and if she did she
would certainly contract Il speedy case
of pneumonia
y y
Just what form the war will take this
winter has not yet been made known.
When Mrs. Grannis first began her cru
sade some unkind critic observed that
her hostility to the decollete gown was
due to the fact hat she could not becom-
ingly appear in costume of that style
on account of the niggardliness of ma
ture in proportioning the Grannis ply
sique. And the same cynic has more re-
Gently noted the fact that the opposi-
tion of Miss Smith to the wheeling girl
was probably attributable to her own
great amount of averdupois. Miss Smith
at once deried the accusation, saying
that she was not too fat to ride bicycle;
that she only weighed 1876 pounds.
1t can be readily seen from the accom-
panyng pictures of gowns, sketched on
Monday night last, the opening of the
opera season, that they are cut as low
as ever, and in greater variety of ways
than ever before.
If they saw the originals of these the
sight probably sent shivers through the
modest frames of the two crusaders.
Yet the wearers Of these gowns are
women of whom the world at large
speaks highly.
For instance, there was Mrs. Levi P.
Morton in a black velvet gown cut low,
with V-shaped corsage. Mrs. Morton,
aside from being the wife of the COVER
nor OF the state, is distinguished for her
charitable enterprises ana ner devotion
to church work.
. Then there was Mrs Calvin Brlce
and her handsome daughter, Miss Helen
Brice, both in low cut gowns. Mrs. S.
Van Rensselaer, Cruger, famous in the
literary world as plain Julien Gordon,
was there, too, in gown which would
puzzle the uninitiated as to how it was
fastened about the shoulders, so scant
was the material.
Mrs. Theodore Havemeyer. who gives
tens of thousands each year for philan-
thropic purposes, and who is regarded
as veritable angel from heaven by
shopkeepers, because she never asks the
price of anything she buys, was there,
too, in gown cut lower than any of the
others.
Unfortunately none of the ladies of
the Vanderbilt family were in their
boxes, because of the recent death of
Mrs William H. Vanderbilt, otherwise
the two crusaders could have seen how
the feminine members of the richest
family in the country wear their evening
gowns. And the absence of the Wander
bits made many blank spots in the gilt
taring horse show. There are but thir-
ty-five boxes in the tier, and four of
these are owned by members of the fam
lily.
But enough material was in ha:d to
keep the two crusaders busy for sew
oral months to come, and their first fu-
slllades of wrath and Indignation car
be looked for at any moment.
GRACE WYNNE.