SOMETHING LIKE A TROUSSEAU.

Evening Post, Volume XXIX, Issue 108, 30 May 1885, Page 1 (Supplement)

SOMETHING LIKE A TROUSSEAU.

The greater part .of the trousseau of Lady Emmeline Bedford (who was recently married to Sir E. Malet, the English Ambassador at Berlin) has been made in Paris by Madame Landry, of the Eve de la Paix, who has dressed her ever since she came out ; but the furs, lingerie, boots and shoes, and some other smaller items, were bought in that London whence emanates the greater portion of the Duke of Bedford's wealth. The wedding gown is certainly a triumph of art. The velvet brocade composing the bodice and train is in a design of flowers raised in a thick velvet pile upon a satin ground. The centre of each blossom is filled in with embroidery wrought in fine silver wire. The petals are outlined in exquißite pearls. You can perhaps imagine how all these gradations of tint, from the white shining of the silver wire down through the greyish pallor of the pearls to the mellow ivory tone of the velvet flowers, makes the mass of white of a most indescribable softness. The petticoat is of satin with d'Alengon draped across the front in scarves orange blossoms being introduced here and there, adding yet another tone of white, and h still deeper note than any of the others, in the yellow stamens of the opened flowers. The veil is also of point d'Alengon, and the handkerchief is trimmed with similar lace. Even the stockings have a piece of lace let into the front of each. The tiny shoes (for the bride is petite and slight, with very small hands and feet) are of white satin, embroidered with pearls and silver. lam glad to tell you that they have square toes. I hope those painfully - pointed " clipperbuilt" ones will soon disappear from a crippled and limping society. The trousseau includes a magnificent reception dress, made of brocade, which I find some difficulty in describing, lest I should do an injustice to the marvellous bright softness of the colours. The ground is in tho new shade of turquoise blue, and on this are raised velvet roses of the Gloire de lijon and Marshal Niel varieties. The effect is indescribable, so I must trust it to your imaginative powers. This brocade forms tho bodice and train, the latter being finished with a Medicis collar lined with turquoise blue silk, veiled with Honiton lace. On one side of the collar is fastened a Gloire de Dijon rose with velvet petals. The petticoat is of the blue satin, trimmed with graduated flounces of the same. A wide revers on either side, also of satin, intervenes between petticoat and train. These revers are covered with some wonderful Honiton, which was worn by the Duchess of Bedford, the bride's mother, on her weddingday. Another reception dress might be called the rosebud gown, a moss-green velvet bodice and train representing the calyx, and the petticoat, of pink satin and crepe, the partially- unfolded petals of the flower. Each scarf is edged with a flounce of rare old lace. The train is lined with pink satin, and a cluster of moss roses is placed on one side of the low velvet bodice, which is finished off with folds of pink crepe. Another lovely gown is copied from some old family portrait. The brocade of which it is composed is strewn with pale baby rosebuds on a ground oftne old-fashioned tint known as " bloom-colour." The train is mounted in straight full folds, in the manner of the eighteenth century. The long bodice is turned back from a waistcoat of silver brocade trimmed with lace. Truly the ladies of Berlin will be plentifully supplied with material j for conversation in some of these wonderful gowns. The buttons of this one alone are in themselves a reminiscence of the bygone time. They are brilliants imitated in paste of the kind more rare than diamonds themselves, and almost as valuable. Another of Lady Frmyntrude's reception dresses is of white satin trimmed with a novel embroidery in two shades of gold, worked in a raised design on white crepe. The pointed bodice, cut low, is trimmed with this embroidery round the shoulders. A pointed plastron of the same trims the front. The skirt is edged with a fringed-out ruche of white satin, above which are scarf-shaped trimmings of the crepe. At either side is a revere of the satin, edged with the gold embroidery. The long, straight train is also trimmed with it, laid on in curved lines. Then there is a wonderful ball dress of very pale apple green tulle, trimmed round the skirt with a trelliswork of real gold, wrought into due lightness by some skilful hand. Innumerable tassel led pendants of gold finish off this trellis-work above and below. The workmanship dates some distance back in the world's history, and this curious gold trimming forms one of the Duchess of Bedford's numerous and valuable presents to her daughter. As though growing behind, and peeping out from, this lattice-work, is a profusion of violets, some erect, whilst others bang from their limp stalks. The green satin bodice is trimmed with a similar pergola of gold-imprisoned violeta. The teagowns are veritable inspirations. A delicious one is of ivorytinted ottoman, draped with embroidered silk muslin aad silk lace. Another is of mirror-grey velvet, over a tablier of pale-pink crepe, veiled

with folds of wbit<» embroideml net. Thfl sides of the train .are trimmed with tbis net, tied up with bows of pink ribbon. One of tho walking dresses is in the deep shade of red-brown or brownred that we sometimes see in chrysanthemums and in the darker blossoms of the wallflower. The skirt consists of alternate panels of the velvet and of silk-beaded passementerie in tho same colour. The bodice has a collar and rest of this beaded galloon, for it is scarcely correct to describe it as pessementerie. I am not milliner enough to know its technical name, and if I were I do not suppose you would understand it To match this dross are a mantle, bonnet, and muff, each and all being trimmed with the beaded silk galloon. Another beautiful walking dress is of grey corduroy, trimmed with skunk, the pointed tabs in which the skirt is cut tailing over a deep flounce of the fur. A closely-fitting jacket of the corduroy is also tiimmed with skunk. There aro bonnets and muffs to match all these visiting nnd walking dresses— t oi lleis de ville the Piuis milliners call them A very Tfew and original one is made of dark peacock-blue velvet, with bands of lophophore or peacok's breast feathers (I cannot tell which) running down the skirt and dividing the velvet into panels. Slender panels of dark sapphire jet hedge in the feather ones, and the bodice has a vest and collar of jot, edged with feathers. A sweet little mantle to match is edged with feathers, and has epaulets of the blue jet. There ! When the bride appears in that costume Unter den Linden, will not the Berlinese open their eyes and wish for a double pair? — 11 Mudge," in Truth. .