The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1903-08-29

A famous physician, a fashionable
bOotmaker, a successful portrait paint
er, brilliant cartoonist and three beau
tiful women have recently contributed
their views of q newspaper syndicate on
the high-heeled shoe. The physician dis
approves of them emphatically and uu-
reservedly. He is DR.. Cyrus Edison of
New York. a famous authority on hy-
giene. He asserts that no woman can
be healthy and happy who wears high
French heels habitually. He says they
distort the feet, throw the body out of
balance, cause nervous troubles and
other disorders.
The bootmaker says that all he knows
about it Is that the women are wearing
them more and more all the time. They
have never gone out of fashion for dane
ing and house shoes and now they are
worn for all occasions except the out
door sports. They are very stylish, says
this authority, a. J. Cammeyer, who
makes shoes for the fashionable women
OF New York. and he has more de-
mands for them every day. Some wo-
men want their heels two and one-halt
inches high, very slender and curved,
Everyone asks for the Louis XIV heel
and he doesn't think they are injurious
If properly made so that the front OF
the foot rests well on the ground.
Henru Peine du Bots, painter and art
cricit, declares that he can't do much
for the physicians and reformers who
are always wanting women to be by
gienic at the expense of beauty. What
If high heels do "hurt2" They give the
foot beauty, arch, instep, character. The
ankles of the Greek women at Mitylene
were decorated with large serpents of
clear metal which tintinabulated on
high heels. They hurst. The pattens
that were worn by Shakespeare's Juliet
hurt. Monsieur Du Bots idea seems to
be that these fashionable instruments of
torture don't hurt half as much as ug-
Illness, inelegance, lack of style. Il do
not" he concludes like the physician
who is necessarily hurting reasonable
ideas at women. Rationalism is not
good for women. They ought not to lis
ten 10 the psychologists who say that
women are only i'll when we think them
inspired and who explain their sublime
faculty to love and suffer by the pre-
dominance of reflex movements.
For women who live in gilded cages.
says I. f Powers. the cartoonist, high
heels should be admirable. On sandy
beach. for instance they would be dan
gerous. However L have long since
learned that in the search for beauty no
woman minds a tritle like a sDrained
ankle or a broken leg. The woman who
wears them may develop nervous pros
tration or spinal trouble but what of
that if her feet look smaller and her
instep more arched? Even when
lovely woman dons mems trousers as IN
LAS You Like 1t" she clings to her
small feet and again l say she Is right. "
"Why?'
Because she is a woman"
The three women who were interview
ed were Sarah Bernhard. Louise Leslie
Carter and Anna Held. Madame Bern
hardt says: High heels are exquisite
for the woman who knows how to wear
them Every woman does not know how.
They must not be worn for instance If
one is going to start out on a pedestrian
tour. They must not be worn to climb
mountains or play tennis. The woman
who wears high heels must learn to
walk in them just as she learns to man
age a train or carry herself in one of
the cut corsets. / can see no reason why
there should be danger from wearing
high heels. The great argument in their
favor is that they are prettier than low
ones"
1T is all very we'll for sensible people
to recommend fiat heels and short
skirts" says Anna Held "But-well,
most of us prefer not to be sensible. I
have never worn anything but high
heels curved in the middle of the foot
and / live today to tell the tale"
Mrs. Leslie Carter has worn high heels
even since she was a child and declares
her health has always been of the very
best High heels she says are as COM
Portable as any shape and give to the
foot a smart appearance impossible with
any other kind of heel
Lady fair. do you still wear a POM
padour2 The chances are that you do.