The Caucasian. (Shreveport, La.) 1900-192?, 1903-06-14
7 HE New WOMAN IDE |
Fads and Foibles of the
Fair Sex
ME other day a newspaper re-
ported the proceedings of a
Kaman'S club and rrofan cod

| poTte0 the proceedings OF q
woman's club and prefaced
the account with the obserya-
ton that the Selectas prided them
selves On being the most fashionabIy
gowned club of women in the country -
What a mark of superiority, now, to
pride oneself on! To wear the longest,
consequently the uncleanest, dress
skirts, with the highest waists, and
those most heavily and uncomfortably
loaded with embroidery, fringe. lace
inset work and outset work, ribbons,
velvets, buttons big as small saucers
| and in no case made to button, awful
looking peg heeled Oxford ties with
bows SO big they give the appearance
OF bits of rag around the instep, with
| the sky scrapingest hats and the meal
baggiest' sleeves in the United States!
| Isn't that an item for women supposed
| to have brains and immortal souls to
pride themselves on? If O majority of
women's organizations throughout my
country have come to this then / say
better 1t were the woman's club had
| never been invented. In those glorious
Greek statues which have stood for
twenty centuries as the model of all
that is most beautiful in the female
figure is it the clothes of the marble
women that we admire most? Will
American women ever, ever learn that
dress is only an adjunct to beauty and
| not at all beauty itself? The true
aesthetic principle in dress is that it
shall be secondary to the body which it
covers. When a woman is dressed in
such way that her costume attracts
more attention than she herself does
it is an all round admission on her part
that she is nothing in herself, therefore
must resort to costly or bizarre gar
ments to draw notice at all. That is
the impression conveyed by the Seleeta
club. They have no intellectual power.
so must dress to get any notice taken
of them. In this matter of beauty it
is the body itself we should spend time
on, to make it comedy by physical cul-
ture, and not the garments that robe
it. Add to this accomplishments of in
tellect and soul and you will have my
Lady Beautiful
u
Because thing is so in your neigh
borhood is no reason why necessarily
it ought to be so all over this universe.
Don't be provincial.
Golf made John d. Rockefeller over
into new man physically. he says 1t
is just as good for women as for men,
In a Boston school committee report
on coedncation I find this: .'The only
advantage In having the sexes sepa-
rated may be to give inferior teachers
easy positions in girls schools. It is.
fact that certain masters of mixed
schools have separated boys from girls
in order to aid inferior teachers. Z
Do you think girls and women ought
to be supported in idleness by men?
Read what Ella Wheeler Wilcox says:
81 grow to believe there is a curse
upon money we have not earned.
q q
Very bad news from Roumania.
There is likely to be a famine in the
land Roumanian women have struck.
They refuse to do the nations farm
work any more. Thousands of acres
lie unpIowed. growing up in weeds,
the dispatches say. How sad this is!
Our hearts bleed for the hunger and
want of the poor Roumanian men. It
is said. though. that a few of them are
coming up bravely to the scratch and
are preparing to till what they must
of the soil themselves. And the first
result of this is a large order to the
United States for agricultural machin-
cry. Just so. Ne hand labor for his
majesty Man IL he can get out of it.
Well. one doesn't blame him for that.
q q
Mrs. Snapback was a smart widow
with a grown son. The son was six
feet tall and broad and strong in pro
portion. She herself was of good size.
and in good health. She married a
Door, meek. weak little husband. not
much more than half the size of her
son and not so strong as herself. The
poor little husband was expected to
support Mrs. Snapbaek in comparative
luxury For some reason he failed to
fill her ideal of man. so size left him
and sued him for alimeny. which she
obtained He paid il awhile. then fell
i'll. Mrs. Snapbaek sued him for back
nav and demanded also that the regu-
lar amount. 81 a week. be increased. She
appeared in court beautifully gowned
and wearing diamonds. She cast her
gorgeous eyes over the pale, little ex-
husband. then over the court room. and
shifted. '.Oh, my. what smelly place
this isr, she exclaimed. The judge
looked at her. ablebodied enough to
take in washing for living II she
needed to, then at the braWny, big son.
his eagle eye finally lowering over the
pale, meek ex-husband. Little hus-
band" said the judge. you may re-
firee yoy1r wifp,s alino1v To 81 a week