Middlebury register. (Middlebury, Vt.) 1886-1937, 1904-12-30

their bodies in vestments whose fiat
uniformity reminds us of bags, do
violence to their most sacred nature,
and completely misconstrue the spirit
Of things. If garments were intended
only as a protection against the cold
or wet, wrapping cloth or an ami
mails skin would suffice. But it means
much more than that. Man puts his
full self into all the he does. he trans
forms things of which he serve him
self into signs. Costume is not
simple covering; it is a symbol. 1t
attests that in the richness of the
tlowery national and provincial cos
tunes. and those worn by men of our
ancient corporations. Dress also. has
something to tell us. The more it
contains of the senses the more valu-
able it is. That it may be really beau
tful, it must announce good things
things personal and true. Put all the
money in the world on such a one
if there is such a One-without affinity
with the one who wears it. she is but
a mask, and an extraordinary ridicu
lous bundle. The excess of the mode,
in causing the feminine person to
completely disappear under her prin-
cipal attraction. 1t results that this
abuse of many things, which women
find pretty, wrong their beauty as
much as the purses of their hus-
bands and parents.
What would you say of young
girl who, to express her thoughts,
used the most carefully chosen terms,
exquisite even, but repeated textually
from a manual of conversation? What
charm could this borrowed language
have for you? The effect of toilettes,
we'll made in themselves, but which
are seen on everybody else, is exactly
the same.
Z do not resist the temptation of
citing here a passage from Camille
Lemonnier, who supports my idea:
Mature has put a charming art in
the fingers of woman, which she
knows by instinct, and which Is all
her own, as silk is to the worm, or
lace to the agile and clever spider.
She is the poet, the artist of her grace
and her candor; she is the spinner
of the mystery in which her taste of
pleasing is dressed. All the talent
which she puts to her desire to re-
semble man in the other arts will
never be as valuable as the wit and
treasure in the scrap Of stuff which
she makes for herself.
VERY well; l wish that that partic.
ular art were otherwise honored. As
education consists in thinking with
ones mind, in feeling with ones heart
In explaining the little personal
things, the intimate self, latent, but
which, on the contrary, they turn back
or level in view of conformity, would
that the young woman apprentice, the
mother Of the future, should be early
the little aesthetic of the toilette, her
own dresser, she who one day will be
the dresser of her children, but with
taste and the gift of improvisation to
personify herself in this chief work
of feminine personality, a robe-with-
out which woman is nothing more
than a bundle of rags"
The dress that one makes oneself
is nearly always the one that becomes
one best; in any case, it is the one
that gives you the most pleasure.
! That is what most women forget too
often. The working woman and the
/
they all dress themselves from the
ready-made stores, where they sell
very doubtful limitations of the best
styles, grace has almost disappeared
from popular costumes. And yet, is
there in the world anything which has
the gift Of pleasing more than the
fresh appearance of young working
girl, or a young girl from the fields,
dressed in the mode of their country,
and beautiful IN their simplicity only?
These same reflections may be ap-
piled to the mode of arranging and
decorating ones habitation. II there
are toilettes which reveal a whole
conception Of life. hats which are
poems. knots which are cocardes,
there are also arrangements of the
house which. In their way, speak to
the mind. Why, under the pretext of
embellishing our houses, do We take
away from their personal character
which always has its value? Why
make our rooms like those of hotels
or the parlors in railway stations, by
force of making the uniform type OF
official beauty predominant there?
What misery it is to go through the
houses in city, cities, or a country
or the countries of vast continent
and find everywhere certain identical
forms, inevitable, identical, irritating
by multiplicity. How much aesthetic
ism would gain by simplicity! In
stead of this luxury of little notions
flotsam from the sea, all those pre-
tentious but insipid and banal orna
ments, we should have an infinite di
versity. Treasure-trove happily com
bined would strike our eyes. The un
foreseen in a thousand forms would
cause us to rejoice, and we would FIND
again the secret of painting a tapes
try, an old piece of furniture, the roo
of a house. and that seal of human
personality which gives to certain an
tiques an inestimable value.
Let us continue, and pass on tc
things still more simple. | wish t.
speak of the small details of the