ON BUTTONS.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3519, 18 October 1882, Page 4

ON BUTTONS.

A bachelor, writing on buttons, says : — " I don't know how the dictionary-makers would define buttons. I should describe them compendiously as ' the very mischief!' They are botheration in the most con,pact nnd concrete form, and were doubtless, in their origin, prime devices of the Objectionable One to trip tempers and elicit anathemas. I surmise that the chief advantage of Eden was that there was no need of buttons there. Wo are informed that folly waß the precursor of fig leaves, but I am convinced that depravity of a deeper dye led to tho introduction of buttons. Buttons are delusively supposed to be a species of link or fastening, but the actual final cause of buttons is to come off. They always discharge that prime function at the most inopportune moment. Thee give no warning, but parfc company suddenly, and with a spiteful' pop.' The mere sound of a parting button is indescribably aggravating. Buttons are more provocative of interjoctional eloquence than anything with which lam acquainted. Indeed, buttons and explosive rhetoric are inseparable ideas in the male mind. Women seem to get on better ■with the plaguey things ; but then they seem to use them mainly for ornamental purposes. With them they are independent entities, not necessarily connected with contiguous buttonholes. I have seen buttons on a bonnet; I have also tried to count the number of apparently useless buttons on a lady's costume, but have failed. I believe it is nofc within the resources of arithmetic to compute the number of superfluous buttons that may be tagged on to tbe girl's dress. Eeminine buttons are of all sorts and sizes. Some resemble acid drops ; some are after the fashion of miniature beer barrels ; some ure like unto crystal stars ; some like— nothing else in creation. They are of all sizes, from the microscopic to the mammoth. Many diminutive women, I notice, affect; an eruption of huge horn discs, or big bone bosses, that might serve to fasten —gay the top-coat of a Megatherium. Buttons are various, but more or less vile. The most pernicious species is the shirt-button. I •would rather not say what I think about shirt-buttons ; polite language is not equal to the task. 'Ihey aro perversity and provocation incarnate in mother-of-pearl. Tiiey are fertile sources of 'tantrums' and domestic unpleasantness. The shirt-button is the ideal and typical button, and lias all the evil attributes of the species in excelsio. I am convinced that shirt-buttons were nofc generally known in the days of Job, or tho patriarch's arch enemy would never have omitted that iinal trial. Next in order of obnoxiousness is the glove-button. I suppose human ingenuity is unequal to the task of devising another species of fastening, or mankind would nofc have suffered so much for so many generations. The glove-button is a mockery, a delusion, and a snare. As a rule, ifc will nofc fasten at all; hut if ifc dees, it comes off incontinently. It is bad enough to have to deal with one's own glove button, but ladies will sometimes invite one to attend to theirs, and then the tribulation is greatly intensified. A big-iingercd man struggling helplessly with his lady-love's glove button is a spectacle to soften the sternest heart. So many dangers beset him. lie will get red in the face; he will, probably, perspire; he may pinch tho hand ; he may tear the glove ; lie may pull the button off—but the chances "of his achieving the real objects of his efforts are infinitely remote. I could pursue the subject into other regions, but 1 refrain; buttons are a bore, and a bore is a button-holer. 3 he boy known as a ' Buttons ' is the incarnation of mischief and devilry. In line, buttons are emphatically a bad lot;; and the individual who devises something to supersede them will deserve well of humanity in general and the male sex in particular."