The Montgomery advertiser., 1905-07-02
A NEW DANGrR PREDICTED.


 and not without some degree of trep- idation that The Advertiser ever tackles the fashions and. shall we ven- ture 1t? the. foibles of the other and better half of humanity, because we are fr/y aware that it is treading on dangerous ground or skating on very thin ice to even insinuate that what woman does is wrong. While they may not meet us with visor down and lance in rest on the tented field. or may not invite us out to try conclu- sions with pistol or sabre, neverthe- less they have a way of setting mere man back that is likely to jar his nerves or dislocate his spinal column.
 And yet we have 1t on the authority of good old Alexander Pope that fools rush in where angels fear to tread and if we should chance to set foot on holy grounds, as 1t were, we suppose the explanation may be found in the poets axiom. All men with even minute per centage of hard sense know that woman's fashions form part of her especial prerogative. On this mat ter she is a law unto herself. and the mans part is to admire, if he can. or condemn-and keep his mouth shut. Whether he admires or deprecates, however, it is all the same. for she'll have her own way anyhow "and there's the end on t."
 Nevertheless and notwithstanding. when the woman sets out to change and spoil the form divine which God gave her to charm and captivate rough male humanity we feel that he has a right to enter q solemn protest against tampering with that which nature has made well nigh perfect It has not been many years since some iemlnine freak became possessed with the idea that the women of Greece were the ideals of perfect female form. so the uneraceful ana irrational "Greclan bend" was invented by her and many were her victims. We have always entertained a sort of subdued idea that the inventor of this monstrosity was deformed, and that she adopted the shape in order to conceal her own lack of perfection. Be that as 1t may the Grecian bend became the fashion and the sisters followed it. for of what measure is life to woman if she is out of fashion? She don't get out. that's about the size of 1t, so she Grecian- pended as long as it was in the style
 AS if that was not enough we then had A cross between the step of duck and the hop of jack rabbit. and that was called the Kangaroo walk" No one but an expert anatomist could say just what shape a person would need 10 be for such a movement to be natural one, go we are not touchihg that feature of 1t. It Is enough to say that many of the dear sisters adopted it-or tried to-for not all of them could outrage nature far enough 10 make a brilliant success in the mar supial plan of levitation. They nobly tried but the kindly fates. interfered to prevent a total destruction of female gracefulness and naturalness. The kangaroo walk Is discredited.
 Now we are confronted by the in- formation that the next fad to lay hold of woman is what Is called the Parisian sylph figure. This, we insist, is the limit. We are not up very high on sylphs, and there may be spec linens in Paris. but there are none In these United States, let us fervently hope, and should not be. In It's origi- nal signification we believe 1t meant "a spirit light as air." or something Inf the sort but In ordinary vernacular 1t means a slender young girl, and that, we respectfully submit to the honorable court, does not and cannot apply to modern American woman- hood, and God forbid that 1t ever shall. There was a time when Ameri- can women thought the maximum of female beauty lay In the minimum of bust measure. but that time, we hope. is past forever. Outdoor life, gymnas- tic exercises, open air diversions and other healthful and life-giving prac- tices have tended to build up and in vigorate American womanhood to- wards the point God and nature in- tended, and thus to fit her for the most important and holy duties that pertain to human life on earth. A sylph may fit Parisian ideas and ideals, and may fit in nicely with Parisian conceptions of perfect womanhood, and If SO we re- spectfully beg Paris to retain a mo nopoly of the fashion, and hope Amer lean girls and women will levy a pro- hibitive tariff against all such innova- tions. #4..=3 >.... r.. ....
 We are threatened with a hoop skirt epidemic, we are informed, but that will do no real harm to the female form. It will hide the form, take up yards of room, get In the way of ev- erybody and otherwise constitute an almost intolerable nuisance. but will not deform, distort or destroy the ac- tual, physical woman. It will soon pass, as other fads pass. and leave our women uninjured. nor unfit them for woman's part in the great drama of existence. Let the hoop-skirt come, if it must. but ban the Parisian sylph.
 From any point that the Bowen Loomis incident may be viewed the 1l-A s- hA