The Washington times., 1901-09-22
WHEN WE TRAVEL.
The Changes Made in n Decade in
Styles of Travelling Dress.

|
II you have travelled much in the last
| ten or twelve years you must have no.
| ticed-even If you are an unnoticing per-
son-the changes in the styles of travel
ing dress. Twelve years ago we were as
invariably clad in brown holland for our
trips as are the chairs in a London draw
ing-room in midsummer. The linen
duster,'' now not worthy of the notice OF
the comic artist or the jokester in the
daily papers. even enveloping the form
of the Southern hayseed of the Western
Hoosier, was then as prevalent as flies in
May. Whole families of clustered folk
boarded the trains in city and village off
for their summer holidays, and the man
who was brave enough to sit through a
long journey clad merely in his rightfuf
clothes was looked at askance, as If too
untidy to associate with.
True. there was great difference in the
cut of the town and country "duster"
and the former. with its ornaments of
braid and buttons. and breaking out here
and there upon its feminine wearers into
a fiutter of capes and lapels. was a vast
ly superior article to the Iank, untrimmed
specimen worn by Uncle Silas or Jemima
from Jimpsons' Cross Roads.
Gradually, however. these useful, IL un-
handsome garments fell into disuse, even
as the 'over riding skirt and dust
mask of a still earlier day lost their
shoulders of the country politician alone
were broad enough to support them. to-
gether with the shafts of ridicule leveled
al them by the comic papers.
Then We merged into the stage OF the
respectable cast-off. which. having done
duty as best" and second best respec-
lively. we laid aside being the very
thing to travel in. -
Coats little shiny as . the backs, and
trousers a little baggy as to the knees,
were held to be the garments par excel
lence for railway train. while it was
thought no disgrace to wear skirt of
questionable black and sleeves that were ,;
fashionable two seasons before.
Many of us remember the advice given
us by Travelled friends on the CccG sion of
our first trip abroad: Take the Oldest
suit you have for the crossing, and leave
il in your steamer trunk with your rugs.
Advice which we found to oe unques iona
bly, sound
This traveller even remembers to have
gone to such lengths on her first voyage
across the ocean as to chop OFF her then
long and much wooed bang, and to pull a
Tam OShanter so well down over the
stubby results that steamer acquaint-
ance remarked, as she made her appear
landing at Liverpool: Il should never
have recognized you but for your voice.
Now, however, we have changed all
that The travelling gown is a marvel of
elegant tailoring. in cloth or taffeta or
mohair. and the shirtwaist that tops ii.
built by the SWEETEST shirt ta-.or. is the
persOnlIlcdtlon OF StyllSn outlines.
The ''duster" of yesterday was the CO.
coon of the exquisite dust coat of to-
day. garment which bears about the
same resemblance to its predecessor as
the butterfly does to the grub.
Nothing Is considered now too good TO
wear on a train, and the travelling gowns
of smart people are swell enough to wear
to any small entertainment.
Silk, once the abhorred fabric of all
travellers. has crept into such favor that
II has almost superseded other sturs by
reason of its lightness of weight and pow
ers of endurance
Perhaps the greater luxury of the modes
OF conveyance is responsible for the dress
reform We have undergone.
However that may be, 1t Is certain that
ten years have sufficed to transform us
from apparent paupers to princes. and the
which once Travelled under
the incog. of a cast-off frock now shines
Respondent as BELTS its rank.