Butler citizen. [volume] (Butler, Pa.) 1877-1922, 1905-02-02


effect of toilets well designed in them
selves, but seen again and again on
all women indiscriminately. is precise
ly the same
I cannot resist citing here a passage
from Camille Lemonnier that harmo-
nizes with my idea:
Mature has given to the fingers of
woman a charming art, which she
knows by instinct and which is pecul-
iarly her own, as silk to the worm and
laeework to the swift and subtle spi-
der. She is the poet, the interpreter OF
her own grace and ingenuousness, the
spinner of the mystery in which her
wish to please arrays itself. All the
talent she expends in her effort to equal
man in the other arts is never worth
the spirit and conception wrought out
through a bit of stuff in her shiilful
hands.
"Wall I wish that this art were more
honored than 1t Is. AS education should
consist in thinking with ones mind,
feeling with ones heart, expressing the
little personalities of the inmost invis-
ible (which, on the contrary. are
repressed, leveled down, by conformi-
tY-I would that the young girl In her
novitiate of womanhood, the future
mother, might early become the little
exponent of this art of the toilet-her
own dressmaker, in short-ghe who one
day shall make the dresses OF her chill
dren. but with the taste and the gift
to improvise, to express herself In that
masterpiece of feminine personality
and skill, a gown, without which a wo-
man IS 10 more than q bundle of rags.
The dress you have made for your
self is almost always the most becom-
ing, and. however that may be, 1t Is
the one that pieases you most. Wom-
On of leisure too often forget this;
working women also in city and coun-
try alike. Since these last are cos
TUNED by dressmakers and milliners
In very doubtful imitation OF the mod
ish world. grace has almost disappear
ed from their dress. And has anything
more surely the gift to please than the
fresh apnarition of young working
girl or daughter Of the fields wearing
the costume of her country and beau
tiful from her simplicity alone?
These same reflections might be aI'.
piled to the fashion of decorating and
arranging our houses. If there are toll
LET'S which reveal an entire conception
of life, hats that are poems, knots OF
ribbon that are veIttable works OF art,
SO there are interiors which after their
manner speak to the mind. Why, un-
4. f..cr NfIr.
co we destroy that personal character
which always has such valuef why
have our sleeping rooms conform 10
those of hotels, our reception rooms to
waiting rooms, by making predoml-
nant uniform type OF official beauty
What ii pity to 20 through the
houses of a city, the cities of country,
the countries of vast continent, and
encounter everywhere certain forms
Identical, inevitable, exasperating by
their repetitionl How aesthetics would
gain by more simplicity, Instead or
this luxury In Job lots. all these deco
ratIons. pretentlous, but vapid from
iteration, we should have an Infinite
variety; happy appropriations would
strike our eyes, the unexpected III 4
thousand forms would rejoice our
hearts, and we should rediscoyer the
| secret OF tmDressing on q drapery or
a piece OF furniture that stamp or hu-
man personality which makes certain
| antiques priceless.
| Let us pass at last to things simpler
still; mean the little details of house
| keeping which many young people OF
our day find so unpoetlcal. Their con-
tempt for material things, for the hum
| BILE cares house demands, arises from
| a confusion very common. but none the
| less unfortunate, which comes from
the belief that beauty and poetry are
| within some things. while others lack
| them: that some occupations are dis
| tinguished and agreeable, such as cult
waiting letters, playing the harp, and
| that others are menial and disagree
| able, like backing shoes, sweeping and
| watching the pot boil. Childish error!
| Neither harp nor broom has anything
| to do with It, All depends on the hand
| in which they rest and the spirit that
moves it. Poetry Is not In things; 1t
| Id in us. 1t must be impressed on OBJ
| tects from without, as the sculptor I'M
| presses his dream on the marble. If
| our life and our occupations remain
| too often without charm In spite of any
| outward diatinction they may have II Is
| because we have not known how to put
| anything into them. The height of art
IL to make the inert live and to tame
| the savage | would have our young
1 -, oil
| ment OF the truly feminine art of CIV
| Ing soul to things which have none.
| The triumph of womans charm Is in
that work Only woman knows how to
| put into home that indefinable some
thing whose virtue has made the poet
say, "The hougo top reJotces and Is
| glad" They say there are no such
| things as fairies or that there are
fairies no longer, but they know not
what they say. The original of the
fairies sung by poets was found and Ia
still among those amiable mortala who
knead bread with energy, mend rents
with cheerfulness, nurse the sick with
smiles, put witchery into a ribbon and
| genius into Il stew.
1t is indisputable that the culture of
the fine arts has something refining
about 1t and that our thoughts and
acts arc In tho end impregnatcd with
that which strikes our eyes. But the
exercise OF the nrts and the contempla
tion of their products are restricted
privileges. IL is not given to every one
81 possess, to comprehend or TO create
fine things. Yet there Is II kind Of
mlnlsterlng beauty which may make
It's way where-the beauty which
springs from the hands OF our wives
and daughters. Without 1t what Is
the most richly decorated house2 a
dead dwelling place. With 1t the bar
est home has life and brightness.
Among the forces capable of trans
forming the will and increasing happi-
ness there Is perhaps none in moro
universal uso than this beauty. 1t
knows how to shape itself by means
Of tho crudest tools In the midst Of
the greatest difficulties. When the
dwelling Is cramped, the purse limited,
the table modest. n woman who has
the gift finds way 70 make order.
fitness and convenience reign In her
house. She puts care and art into