Year: 1867

] ~


dies Wearing Strings of But


tons.


The latest innovation is the new
fashion lately adopted by, we must


say, silly women, called the ''string of


buttons" These strings consist Of a


stout cord, on which innumerable but
tons are strung through the eye, vary
ing in quantity, quality, color and
value, according to the length Of the
purse or begging qualifications Of the
owner The fashion was first intro
duced in New Albany about two years
ago by the little girls, who, by begging,
buying and trading, soon succeeded in
making their strings quite lengthy,
and 1.-The purse strings of their parents
and friends cOrrespondingly short. In
proof of this We will state that gen
tleman's daughter of this city has
string which cost him one hundred and
.seventy-fve dollars. There are Others
who have them worth from fifty to
seventy-fye dollars, and we are in
formed a young lady of Louisville has
one valued at one thousand dollars
Every girl must have a string of but
tons, and they are called small affairs
that cost from twenty-five to fifty dol
lars each. To such an extent has the
passion taken possession of girls that
they think of nothing else. A few
days since a gentleman who was i'm
portuned by a little girl to buy her
some buttons, went into q dry goods
store, picked out about a dozen and
handed them to her. He was aston
ished when the salesman informed him
that $3.50 was the amount Of the bill.


You can hardl y meet a young miss,
but you see the never-endiDg string of
buttons swinging from her hand, OF
dangling at her side. Indeed, the
fashion has taken possession of the
young ladies, and to some extent it
has affected married women, who ri
val each other in the costliness of, as
they call them, "gems."


. The button mania has become, il
may be said, almost universal, and the
manufacturers are reaping a rich har-
vest. The buttons for this trade are
not put up in sets, but are of all colors,
sorts, sizes and prices on the same
card. Every dry goods store has
them, and as a matter of course it is
the ambition of women to have them,
no matter at what cost, so that their
string eXcels that of their neighbor.


We know a married lady, who is
not possessed Of a great amount Of
sense or worldly goods, who boasts of
having string Of over five hundred
buttons of the finest quality, which
she values at one hundred and fifty
dollars, but which, for any practical
purpose, is not worth cent. They
are certainly very beautiful to behold,
but their dazzling brightness fades be-
fore the thought of how much better
it would be had the owner spent the
money they cost for something use
full. This prOdigal waste of money for
few buttons, simply to crafty vain
desire to excel a. companion, is fraught
with evil to the young, and it is the
duty Of every parent to restrain it.


As one of the results Of the "string
button" mania, we notice that the
Kentucky State Fair Association will
to-day award a premium to the lady
exhibiting the finest string of buttons.
What good results are to be accom-
plished by thus pandering to a silly
piece of nonsense and extravaganza
is beyond our conception, but we pre-
sumo we have Just entered the era of
"Button-buttOn-who's got the but
ton"-[New Albany Qnd) Ledger