The Baltimore County union. [volume] (Towsontown, Md.) 1865-1909, 1902-02-08

boys lett anything OF the kind runnin
around loose 1 dunno what it could
have been. They got twenty-sever
cats, eighteen dogs, twelve rabbits,
five rats, cow, two calves, a pig,
and dummed if them boys didn't
steal DR.. Korkembery's two white
hosses and paint stripes on one oi
them fer graft. 1t cost me So. rs
fer turpentine to clean the paint of
them critters, and it amt all off yit.
AN this number of the paper an.
nounced the next number would con-
tain How to Build Sc, 900 House
fer $345,' and directions fer making
pillershams which would be shammier
than ever, and etiquet lessons for the
girls, and plans for a house-boat fer
the boys, and directions fer wife to
make her husbands shoes. / read
that there paper, and then riz up
like worm when he's stepped on.
"Now this here's the biggest rea-
son of all why I'm a-settin' out here
dallying This here is the day fer
that paper won't come. After I read
that last one 1 sent the enterprising
editor another dollar and told him to
stop his ding battered paper. And
now I've got to go i'll and break the
news to them poor cosy-corner, fancy
dish-concocting women, and to them
innercent amusement-loving boys
but amt hankering after my job. "
A woMAN's POINT OF VIEW.
Among the curious vagaries of fash
ion in feminine attire, nothing is
stranger than the submissive acquies-
cence in its despotism side by side
with the incalculable caprice of its
fluctuations. Consider, for example,
the helpless, almost abject, tone the
chronicler of the passing modes is con-
strained to take in the pages of her
particular periodical. Here is an OBJ
servation extracted recently: 1t
goes without saying that close fitting
dresses and clinging costumes are still
the correct thing, and many women
who not so long ago Stunned making
themselves, as they considered, no.
ticeable by adopting this style, will,
if they persist in not following it,
render themselves not merely notice
able, but conspicuous and even eccen-
tric." II grieve," says another, "to
record the fact that skirts are longer
than ever-in fact, they are worn dan
gerously long in front" Or, take
this paragraph from fashionable con-
temporary: 'It is extraordinary to
what serpent-like proportions the
skirt has dwindled. One can hardly
attempt to sit down in it, much less
to walk, that is to say, what we gen
orally understand by walking. We
must now just move and glide, sweep
ing the carpets and streets as we do
So" II should like" writes an
other, ito enter my protest against
the abominable fashion of clinging
and trailing skirts. We have had
fashions grotesque, fashions inconve-
nient, and fashions unbecoming in the
extreme, but have we not of late years
laid the fattering JUNCTION to our souls
that Englishwomen at any rate were
beginning to shake off the trammels
of French conventionality of attire.
Why, then, in the name of all that is
sensible and sane, are we to be con-
demned to a fashion which is not only
idiotic, and renders anything like
free and graceful movements an i'm
possibility, but which is also unclean-
ly IL the extreme?"
Unfortunately, Madame la Vogue
is too often neither sensible nor sane.
Recall the monstrous Victorian
crinolines, revival of bygone hoop
ed horrors, and next the suggestive
indecency of the tied-back gown, the
vestural affections of the eshetes, the
hideous sleeve-puffs sticking up like
horns from the shoulder and disfgur-
ing even the prettiest woman S shape,
the mimicry of male attire, and of
late the prodigious dimensions and
top-heavy Celebrations of feminine
head-dress.
One often wonders what it is ex-
actly which dominates and compels
women, even your modern Individual
istic independent" to fall in more
or less with every passing mode.
Even the most sensible and sturdy
minded of the sex bow the knee, how
ever reluctantly, in the fashion-house
of Rimmon. So soon as the oracle
speaks from the cryptic shrine, the
great feminine chorus submissively
accepts the decree. Sleeves are to
be fuller this season." "Our best
gowns will be chiefly of lace, "black
tulle toques are going to be indispen-
sable" "Parady plumes, alas again
appear on all our millinery, and the
chiffon reigns supreme" etc, etc.
For mere man, it almost seems sac
riligious to utter these mysteries,
which are mostly little more than
names to his undiscerning mind. But
the point they emphasize, as one
glances through these crisp dulcet
enumerations of costumes delight
some, is the confidently assumed and
yet very real coercing force of the
sweet sex to buy and wear what is
worn at the moment, be it pretty, be
it ugly, whether they like it, or like
it not. Doubtless, it will be answer
ed on the feminine side that it is
originality within certain fixed lines
of conformity that is aimed at by the
best-dressed women. But, neverthe-
less, the great mass of the sex have
neither the leisure nor the aptitude
for such studies, and can but feebly
follow in the ways along which they
are driven.
Such an unusual number of inter-
esting young women have this year
crossed that narrow line, "Where the
brook and river meet" and with
more or less lavish display and notori-
- L. 4 l.. 4. i IL. e.