The Savannah morning news., 1901-07-07


ing shop, but they need not have brains.
All that Is required of them is a beau
tiful figure, pretty face, a graceful car
riage and charming manner. The man
nequins Of the dressmaking quarter are
probably the handsomest women in Paris,
and have figured in innumerable ro-
mances and scandals. One of the most
sensational scandals of recent days CEN
tered around a mannequin who was par
ticularly popular with English customers
and was employed almost altogether for
the displaying of tailor-made gowns and
what are known as English modes. In
certain houses mannequins are chosen to
represent the style and figure of various
nationalities; so that, for example, a
Spanish woman may see the gowns on
Spanish type, an English woman on an
English type, etc A mannequin in a first
class house gets about $500 or 800 a year.
Certain famous dressmakers affect great
exclusiveness. The air of their establish
ments is quite different from that of the
shops. Everything is more reserved, more
severe. The prices are quite as high as
in the shops, but certain artistocratic -wo-
men prefer the privacy and exclusiveness
of these appartement couturieres.
Prof. Charles Eliot Norton delivered an
address at the Radcliffe College COM
mencement exercises on Tuesday concern
ing the part which educated American
women should play in the redemption of
''our vulgar, semi-civilized America" The
address, says a New York Sun special,
was listened to with the closest attention
by the seventy-four graduates and was
greeted by great applause Among 9TH
er things he said:
The best service which you can render
in the world is to make yourself the liv-
ing representatives of ideals of beauty
in character and in conduct. This is the
justification of your strength. From low
est to highest act of daily commonplace
| experience there is none in which an ideal
loveliness may not display Itself.
THE world will do its best to hinder
you from perfecting yourselves by expos
ing you to the influence of the low mo-
tives and the vulgar ambitions of its vo-
taries. But be faithful to yourselves and
to your own ideals, so that you may ex-
| hibit in the world the fair ideal of true
womanhood.
There was never greater need OF the
incompatible service which you can rem
| der by so doing than there Is to-day in
| our vulgar, semi-civilized America The
advance of civilization depends on the
| joint efforts of the little band Of women
| and of men whose education has given
| them understanding OF the true aims of
| life.
| The final aim and effort of civilization
is to make life pleasanter, and this is the
object Of what we can call good man
| ners. With the rapid rise in the social
orders of the great masses of men and
women who till very lately, have had lit
tie share of civility there is risk of the
lowering of the standard of manners by
| the mere force of mora gravitation
The vulgarity of the multitude affects
even those to whom vulgarity is aphor-
rent. The mind becomes more or less in
| jured to it. By degrees in its less odious
forms, 1t may even cease to shock And
1t is for you, the gentle and well-bred
! u conform in nothing to the vulgar STAN
dard, and, in the crowd, to set the exam
| pie of refinement elegance and propriety
! There is one form of vulgarity to which
you young women are in these DAYS spe-
cially susceptible and exposed 1t is the
exaltation of brute force and skill in the
eXaggeratfon of esteem for athletic Prov
ess. You are tempted to rival your
brothers in sports fit for men alone, and
you are still more tempted to admire as
the height OF manly achievement what at
its best is merely evidence of qualities
of body and mind in which civilization
| counts for little, and in which the barba-
| rian may equally excel
! Physical strength, athletic ability are
good for little unless they are the basis
and support of higher moral and intel
| lectual performance. We forget the names
of the winners of the Olympic games. 1t
was not they who won the fight at Mara
thon. Alcibiades might be among them.
but not Aeschylus or Pericles.
| In democracy like ours 1t is the yyo-
men who are the makers of manners and
who are in a great part the makers of
morals as welA II is not through the ex-
pansion of political privileges, not
through possession of the franchise. or
the holding of office that you women can
exert your strongest influence in the i'm
provement of politics. The greater aues-
lions of public concern are uI-
! timately always questions of NOR
ais, and your power, in itself
mainly a moral power, can be exercised
to most effect by requiring of men in
| public life as strict adherence to the
principles of morality, OF manners, and of
honor as is demanded of them in their
| private conduct.
THE laxity OF women in their con-
| domination of public crime, their uncon-
| Germ as 10 the breaking OF national faith
their encouragement OF the lingo spirit
their Indifference to the sin and horror
of war is one Of the gravest evidences
of the low stage of our own boosted and
boastful civilization"