(To be concluded.)
FROCKS FOR TO-MORROW.
By “THE LADY DRESSMAKER.”
Just now there is a very general feeling that women need more oxygen than they get. I do not know if it be owing to the largely-published fact that the Queen spends most of her day in the open air; but certain it is that one of the newest fashions is that of walking, and this has taken, with the leaders of London fashions, the place of cycling, to which they were so devoted two seasons ago. Most of the great ladies might have been seen in the Park during the past spring taking an early walk, frequently accomplishing the round of the Park at a good even pace, which meant exercise and health. Of course, now we know that the best way to avoid fat and keep the slender figure of youth is to walk regularly and constantly, and that any dietary or starving process is unsafe, it is easy to decide the matter for ourselves. Three miles a day is said to be enough, though some people say more. At any rate, it is the regularity which contains the charm and makes its success. And the doctors say that oxygen is what is needed to keep the eyes bright and the skin fair and healthy. So, fortunately, walking is cheap besides being fashionable, and it is the only way to find that physical energy without which one is inert and languid. So, now that I have told my readers the latest development in this way, they should try to lay in such a stock of energy during the coming autumn and winter as shall make them perfect giants in ordinary life.
BRAIDED FAWN CLOTH GOWN FOR AUTUMN.
There is another subject which is rather akin to this one, of which I find a note, and that is the general complaints of eye-trouble made this spring and summer by cyclists. It is said to be a form of spring ophthalmia, caused by the particles of dust and decaying matter with which the atmosphere is loaded, which also affect the throats of those who are in the habit of riding with the mouth open. One of the great London dailies has mentioned this subject, and a London specialist of renown has declared that the remedy for the first trouble is to have a pair of spectacles with crape sides—as the wire sides are too hot—and to keep the mouth shut while cycling. A mild antiseptic is used for the eye-trouble, for which a doctor should be consulted.
CASHMERE AUTUMN GOWN.
And now, having informed you of the very latest modes in this direction, we may turn to another note of mine, made at the Women’s Congress in July last, when I quickly noticed one thing, that American women, who are strong on matters of hygiene and ready to take advice on it, had all dismissed veils both with hats and bonnets, and that all the Englishwomen present, with hardly an exception, wore them—of every kind and colour. In fact, an Englishwoman feels her face unclothed without a veil to hide it, and the idea of its becomingness and that it hides the ravages of time is a constantly alleged reason. The American woman, like Gallio, cares for none of these things, and she looks as well. Certainly her skin is as clear and healthy as anyone else’s, and perhaps it is better and rosier in hue. She has attended lectures innumerable on personal hygiene and on physical culture until she knows a few things by heart. They are, that neither sun nor air are enemies to woman’s beauty; and that science declares that veils of all kinds are of no good for anything, and that they affect the eye and its sight most injuriously. The subject of the danger of spotty veils has been frequently ventilated, and yet our women and girls do not seem to have taken notice of the warning. I was much struck with the docility of the Americans in this way; they really tried to follow out every suggestion and discovery which made for better health and improved powers and energies in daily life.