The Republican journal. [volume] (Belfast, Me.) 1829-current, 1904-03-31

DiSSS lOi 4AVASloC Va 0AAVACAt Minus
Suitable Dress for Social Functions.
BY CHRISTINE TERHUNE HERRICK,
Author of "Cradle and Nursery" "First Aids
to the Young Housekeepers, ''"HOusekeep-
ing Made Easy" What to Eat Gin City
Tents Etc.
Copyright 1904, by Christine Terhune Herrick.l
Never yet was there normal woman
who did not want to dress well. What
dressing we'll means is determined by
each one for herself. In the early stages
it probably meant unlimited fig leaves,
and little later a new pelt from this
or that animal or a new style in a gar
ment woven of the bark of trees.
Such simplicity has unfortunately
come to an end. The point has been
reached where a woman cannot dress
as she pleases, but must please to dress
like the majority of women. 1t is a
blessed dispensation that she usually
likes to be in the fashion, or somewhere
near it, and feels it no hardship to con
form to prevailing NODES In fact, she
usually likes it. Her chief difficulty is
how to manage to conform when she
Appropriate dressing should be an
easy matter for the woman who has a
generous allowance for her wardrobe.
Then il is her own fault if she does not
have suitable costumes for every emer-
gency. Appropriate dressing is also
without complications for the women
who never go anywhere except to
church, and whose needs are supplied
by working frocks and one gown for
best. Even such an one doubtless thinks
she has her troubles, but they are as
nothing to those of the woman VINO
must so to speak, serve two masters
or who, in other words, must fill more
functions than those of the housekeep-
er and church goer, and must dress for
these other things without exceeding a
comparatively small sum. Such a woman
finds dressing well more or less of a
problem-usually more rather than less.
To women like this the fashion of
separate skirts and waists has come as
a positive boom In the days when one
must have a whole gown of one ma
terial, dressing was more complex even
than it is now. Every one whose mem
DRY goes back to those times can recall
how the waists gave out before the
skirts and left one with supply Of the
latter in tolerable order and painful
dearth of the former. Now, when one
has a skirt of which the body part is
past worthy, shirt waist can be made
TO take the place of the outworn gar
ment.
Even with this expedient it is still
possible for women to make mistakes
III their dressing. One of the chief OF
these they commit when they buy con-
S1l1a al I D1yJ1
OF the woman who must wear one gown
be charming at first, but before the
frock or the hat or the coat is half worn
out the woman who wears it and the
friends who see her wear it are tired to
death of it.
Another bh.nder that women make
sometimes is in buying articles of APP
parel which will not 60 together Well
We all know the woman who has bought
snuff coiOred gown and a drab jacket,
OF dark green gown and a hat trimmed
with blue that makes a discord of
tlnts that set the teeth on edge The
woman who must economic on her
clothing must buy things that go to-
gether we'll and every piece of her attire
must be selected, not for its beauty
alone, but because it will harmonic
with the rest of her costume.
Simple styles should also be chosen by
the woman who can have only limited
wardrobe. Extremes in fashion should
be avoided There is the same objection
to these that there is to the startling
effects to which | referred moment
ago. More than this, such woman
should study what suits her. Because
certain garment looks we'll in a fashion
plate or ON figure III a show window
1t does not follow that it will do as
much ON every woman. One would not
believe the blunders which women will
make, did not one see Illustrations of
such breaks or every side. The stout
women who wear light fabrics of large
and tiarlng patterns, the slim ''Slanky"
women who adopt styles with long
severe lines, the short dumpy figures
that cut themselves III two in the mid
die by conspicuous belts or by a glaring
contrast between the hues of the stuff
of the skirt and the waist. encompass
us about Oh every side.
The tailor is the best friend of the
woman who must be economical about
her clothes. A tailor made gown, if the
style III which it is fashioned is care
fully chosen, is likely to suit almost any
AS uiC. Ilo olui lliClty ulodi Llo SlItIClSIl
and renders it appropriate for nearly
any occasion except one where full dress
is required. The woman who has a
tailor made skirt and jacket of good cut
can let her fancy go bit in the matter
of shirt waists. She may have them
plain and serviceahle for morning wear,
dressy and frilly for calling or the the
atre or small social affairs, and she may
seek a compromise between the two for
waist to wear to church or to lectures.
And with each and all of them there
may be worn the same skirt and no one
will comment upon the persistency with
which it appears, so long as the waist is
what it should be and the skirt itself is
not startling in color or style.
Black is a boon to the woman who
can afford only one or two new cos
TUNES year. She must buy good black
in the first place and then, if she takes
tolerable care of it, it will look we'll
always. For the women who object to
black, (and there are such women) there
are dark blue, dark green, dark brown
and the other intermediate shades or
mixtures that are plentiful With one
good tailor made gown of heavy weight
for winter wear, another of lighter ma
terial for spring and fall, and shirt !
waists, plain and dressy, at discretion,
a woman may feel provided for, even if