The Appeal. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn. ;) 1889-19??, 1898-01-15

The New Years Toilette of a Japanese Belle
Ta- most elaborate New Year loll-.les
| in the world are made by Japanese bellies.
| The women Of Japan have been having
| a New Year for hundreds of years before
| the women Of Christian countries. accord
| ing to their chronology of the age Of the
world, and they have learned to make
| much more of it than the women of shorter
| lived Chrisctian nations.
| The New Year in Japan, falling little
| later than ours, brings the flowery king
| dom into it's full fowerness; and on that
| day the whole glad New Year is called in
| to celebrate the advent of another twelve
! month"; -, -
| 1t is commonly supposed that women in
| Japan hold secondary place to men and
| and that festival could be carried on
| by them and for them. But, far from be-
| ing the case. there is no nation on earth
| that values it's highly as the
| Japanese, nor no country where the New
| Year is more beautifully ushered in by
them.
Women have a strange way all over the
| world Of bringing in the New Year. Other
| holidays are common to ALL men and wo-
men, but the New Year seems devoted to
women alone.
In Japan on New Years day the ladies
are up early and making a most elaborate
| toilet. The toilet Of Japanese woman is
always a refined one, and the sweetest Co.'S
| metics and the most delicate Of scents are
employed for her, Identification. But the
New Year toilet is something specially
fine. IT,. s..." I'd. iii III e..
On the New Year the Japanese belle, like
the Chinese one, wears no old clothes.
Everything from her flowing silk outer
garments to her straight delicately woven
underwear is all new. Her favOrite color
is pink, and her robes are gorgeous IN
cOlOrs of pink and red.
She makes her toilet sitting on the floor
with a silk robe around her. When she
gets out of her peculiar little bed upon
the floor and lifts her shapely head from
her smooth, round pillow, she gets into a
perfumed bath, in the taking Of which she
is assisted by her female servants, II
she be a woman of very high rank, and by
the women Of her household if she be of
good family but not wealthy. Her perfum-
ed bath Is poured into a tub and a little
| mating screen is set around the tub. H.
to the water she gets, while her women sit
outside the screen upon the clean mating
floor. -, .-.
When the time comes for a shampoo
Of the flesh the bather rises and the women
| of the family assist her, making sport
of this daily ablution. In this respect the
heather differs from the Christian. A
Christian woman conceals the fact that she
| battles, and beyond doing so daily for
cleanliness spends no time in the bath. 1t
the heather talks Of it, and, the fables are
full of the wives of high dignitaries whose
daily round of happenings took place in
| the gardens through which they walked
while going to and from the bath. y. g.
The bath over, and on New Year day it
Is prolonged, the Japanese woman bather
sets up her little easel and, taking her place
upon the floor, begins to beautify herself.
Her fine soft brown skin is massaged
! with grease perfumes and washed with
han iS1f0 %f@
smoothed streaks Of black CREASED paint
to make them longer. The peculiar slant
| Ing eyes Of the Japanese belle are caused
largely by the way she puts on the Grow,
paint. and the tales that are told Of opera
lions to change the form Of the Japanese
| style for the eyes is less slanting than It
| used to be and what we would fippantly
call the style for 1898 is almost as straight
| as our own. 1872 frs.a. y Il = III
| of the belle to make a pointed pout and a
| tiny bit Of rouge is put upon the point of
her chin. .-.g..tt .I,-.,s..is-r 4, Il.
| The Japanese rouge Is a smooth, soft
| thing, much like our vaseline, and is not
unpleasant to thought or touch. y q
| When her toilet is made the Japanese
| belle plays with her children upon the floor,
talks with her women, embroiders and con-
ducts her household affairs. She does not
receive strangers into the house as it is
not etiquette to do so, nor does she receive
men callers unless they accompany her hus-
band home, in which case she may, If they
be specially honored friends Of the family,
wait upon them with the New Year rice
cake and whey. 1.lEs4
The Japanese belle makes her pretty New
Year toilette for her own husband, and
when you see how carefully she prepares
herself to be beautiful in his eyes you think
that, after all, the religion that animates
her life Is not so bad.
= ,.ai f RALPH CRIJGER