The above describes the dress as Mrs. Bloomer wore it at the time it was written, but she afterwards abandoned the elastic band and allowed the trousers to hang loose about the ankle. The general opinion expressed in those early days was favorable.
Mrs. Russell Sage, now a venerable and highly respected matron, was a young woman and a resident of Syracuse at the time of Mrs. Bloomer’s visit to that place to attend a Temperance convention; in a recent interview, she thus describes her appearance at that time:
“Mrs. Bloomer came as a delegate and her appearance excited some attention. Her manner was unpretentious, quiet and delicately feminine. Her costume showed a total disregard for effect, and was mannish only to the extent of practicability. Her bodice was soft and belted at the waist, her collar simple and correct, as was also her prim bonnet; her skirt fell half way from knee to ankle, and then the bloomer—really a pantalet—made of black material, as the rest of her costume, reaching to her boot tops.”
The interviewer continues:
“As Mrs. Sage so knew Mrs. Bloomer, she agreed she was entirely what she aimed to be—a practical woman, progressive and competent of realizing results from her theories.”
WOMAN’S ATTIRE.
On this subject Mrs. Bloomer, in an elaborate review (only a part of which is here presented) of a sermon by the Rev. Dr. Talmage in which he had quoted Moses as authority for women not wearing men’s attire, wrote as follows:
“There are laws of fashion in dress older than Moses, and it would be as sensible for the preacher to direct us to them as to him. The first fashion we have any record of was set us by Adam and Eve, and we are not told that there was any difference in the styles worn by them. ‘And they sewed fig-leaves together, and made themselves aprons’: Genesis, iii., 7. Nothing here to show that his apron was bifurcated, and hers not; that hers was long, and his short. We are led to suppose that they were just alike.
“The second fashion was made by God Himself, and it would be supposed that if He intended the sexes to be distinguished by their garments explicit directions would have been given as to the style of each. ‘Unto Adam, also, and unto his wife, did the Lord God make coats of skins and clothed them’: Gen. iii., 21. Not a word as to any difference in the cut and make-up of the coats. No command to her that she must swathe and cripple herself in long, tight, heavy, draggling skirts, while he dons the more comfortable, healthy, bifurcated garment. God clothed them just alike, and made no signs that henceforth they should be distinguished by apparel. And for long years there was little, if any, difference.”
After showing the character of the dress of different ancient nations, Egyptians, Babylonians, Israelites, Persians, Romans, Saxons, Normans, Turks, and Chinese, and that there was no essential difference between the dress worn by men and women, Mrs. Bloomer proceeds: