Year: 1877

1t is Just Now Approaching a State Of
Perfection.


Cincinnati Commercial


Within the memory Of the present
generation there never was time when
the prevailing fashion of woman's dress
contained the possibility at once Of so
much beauty, comfort and convenience
as it does at present. We say the pos
sibility Of all this, mind you, for women
generally run things into the ground,
and though the present fashion of dress
is in reality quite simple affair, never
theless women manage to extract con-
siderable worry out of it after all.


There has not been time within
twenty years when the fashionable dress
contained essentially less that was alb
surd, and more that was in accordance
with practical common sense, from the
fashionable lady's boots to her parasol.
Her boot heels are moderately low and
broad, vast improvement on the horri-
BILE, stilted, pointed, pegs on which
woman, if she was fashionable, had to
totter few years ago. These stilted
pegs pitched the foot forward into
narrow, pointed-toed boot, which was as
ingenious an instrument of torture as
the inquisition ever desired. 1t raised
corns, distorted the toe-nails, and de-
formed the ball of the foot till the joint
stuck out in great ugly knob or knot.
1t made fat foot look like kidney or
an early rose potato, while to the long
narrow foot it was murderous. With
the present fashion, fashionable lady
may wear a square-toed boot if she likes,
and woman who cares at all for the
beauty of her foot will always wear the
square toed boot 1t makes even a fat,
thick foot look simmer and more like
the narrow foot, which is considered
mark of aristocratic birth. 1t disguises
the knob or bunion on the ball Of the
foot, and it makes the slender, pretty
foot look even daintier and more high
stepping;


Consider too, the difference, in parasols
between now and fifteen years ago.
Then lady's parasol was not much big
ger than ones two hands, and was load
ed down with heavy, useless fringe or
lace, which was always catching on peo-
pies buttons and this and that, until it
was public nuisance.


Now the parasols are large enough to
use as rain umbrellas at a pinch, and
they are either black or in very dark
rich shades of color which hurt nobody's
eyes. These umbrellas are as elegant
and expensive as ever, but the elegance
is that OF true, pure taste, which never
loses sight Of the use an article is in
tended for.


In hair-dressing there has come about,
so quietly that we have scarcely noticed
it, a sweeping and entire revolution.
From having her head weighted down
almost like an Alaska. Indians, few
years ago, and that, too, with mass OF
material not at all pleasant to wear or
to mediate on, it has come about that
many elegant and fashionable ladies
now wear for "dress up only the hair
that nature gave them. 1t has come
about that unless lady positively in
sists on it, she need not gouge her scalp
with hair-pins and twists her hair out
by the roots any longer, but may dress
it loosely, lightly and comfortably, and
at the same time have it in fashion, too.
The light puffs and little curls of false
hair sometimes worn on top OF the head
are not heavy or heating enough to be
uncomfortable or unhealthy. What,
perhaps, is the best Of all, too, there
could hardly be prettier or more be-
coming way of dressing the hair than
the present fashion. All in all, is it not
a change for the better?


A revolution in favor of common
sense has taken place throughout in
womens dress 1t is the fashion for
ladies to dress far more warml in win
ter than they did twenty years ago.
Their clothing is of heavier, warmer ma
terial, their stockings 60 above their
knees, and their boots are made of good
substantial leather. A ladys winter
overcoat is made of much the same ma
terial as man S, now -a-days, proving that
fashion does sometimes consult common
sense.


Furthermore, grouty old grandfathers
and would-be smart young newspaper
men may say whatever witty and sar-
castle things they please about pull
backs and pin-backs, but after all, with
the exception of one or two absurdities,
presently to be mentioned, when was a
womans dress lighter, more comforta:
BILE, more economical, more artistic, and
more becoming than it is now? Look
at an old fashion-plate representing the
enormous ''tilters" Of fifteen years ago,
if you would behold a monument to the
folly of fashion. Dress skirts were then
five yards around, and were drawn into
great mass of gathers at the waist,
which made them heavy, heating, and
uncomfortable in the extreme. Now a
skimp little skirt or two, with nearly or
quite no gathering at all at the waist,
takes the place Of all those cumbersome
heating yards of material Over the
skimp little skirt fits closely the ever
graceful polonaise, with its pretty folds
creeping down lower and lower toward
the ground, till presently, it is to be
hoped, it will quite touch, and then We
shall have the perfection Of a wOman's
garment, dress all in one piece. That
will be the Princess dress, the prettiest
and most convenient dress woman ev-
er wore, and the most becoming to all
sizes, shapes, styles, and ages of women.
The heating gathers around the hips
and waist are all gone, and good rid
dance to them.


A year or two ago, at a Women S
Congress in Boston, a fashionable and
somewhat noted dressmaker, Mrs. Flint,
said that for sixteen years she had worn
only the Princess dress. If belts were
fashionable, she wore belt with it; if
basques, she put an imitation of a
basque skirt around her waist, with
whatever bows, streamers, or lappels
that were necessary; but through all
she adhered to her dress all in one
piece, and passed for fashionably
dressed lady in the bargain. For per
manent fashion for woman's dress, she
considered that there was nothing so be-
coming, convenient, economical and
graceful for all women whatsoever, as
the Princess dress.


Fashion bids fair to come quite to
Mrs. Flints standpoint very shortly
Even now there are but two pieces to a
dress, and those neither heavy nor cum
bersome, the polonaise and skirt The
simple polonaise draped low down be-
hind is as graceful as it can be. Consid-
er, Grouty, what an improvement all
this is on even five years ago. The wri-
ter hereof remembers now young lady
dressed for party one evening some