Women in Print.

Evening Post, Volume LXXVI, Issue 111, 6 November 1908, Page 9

Women in Print.

"Thero is nothing Spring cannot promise the poor hungry human heart with his inno-cent-looking daisies and his practised liarß, the birds." —Le Gallienne.

Mrs. Biley and Mrs. Erskine Nicholl arrived from Christchurch this morning. Mrs. Fyler, wife of the captain of H.M.S. Encounter, is a guest of Mrs. Tuson's. Mrs. Macrae, from Nelson, is staying with her daughter, Mrs. Firth. She intends to go to Masterton later on in November. Miss Appleton, who has been staying with Mrs. Cecil Jones, left for Melbourne yesterday. Mrs. and Miss Carew, who arrived by the Sydney boat, left for Dunedin last night. Mrs. Vallance and Miss Vallance, who ] have been staying with Mrs. Hayward, at the Hutt, returned to Masterton yesterday. Miss Queenie Nelson, who has been in Wellington staying with Miss Coates, returns to Auckland on Saturday. Miss Ida Neill, from Feilding, is a guest of Mrs. Finch. Mrs. Archibald Whitson, from Makotulcu, is in Wellington, staying at the Hotel Arcadia. A delightful little morning tea for some Dunedin friends was given yesterday by Mrs. W. A. Kennedy. Roses from Picton decorated the pretty draw-ing-room. Among those visitors to Wellington present were Mrs. and Miss Carew, the Misses Mackerras, and Miss Ida Neill. We came home charmed with Mrs. Wiggs and her quaint coterie of friends. On the way — in the tram, on the street, from the open windows of the passing cabs — there were heard scraps of the cheery philosophy and squeaky imitations of the inimitable Miss Hazy. Criticisms may be varied, but there is no doubt the play has delighted many. There was not a vacant seat in circle and stalls last night, and the audience was appreciative. Three men in particular chuckled enthusiastically all through, the play. Many familiar faces were to be seen, among them those of Lady Ward, Miss Ward, and Miss Rubi Seddon. Noticeably handsome was a lady in emerald-green velvet, with a bertha of lace, and a girl in pale-blue, with full net sleeves, looked charming. Very pretty was a high-necked grey silk, with transparent yoke, beautifully-fitting high collar, and touches of embroidery. The wearer's hair was deftly coiffeed, and decked with two rosettes of gold tissue. Two graceful white burnooses were among the prettiest of the wraps worn. A "household gift" tea- is a pleasant 1 variation from the well-worn "handkerchief" and "kitchen" entertainments, and Mrs. Stanton Harcourt's, for Miss Kathleen Otterson, given yesterday afternoon, was a decided success, the brideexpectant receiving all sorts of delightful gifts, useful and ornamental, for tho pretty house that is being built in Karori. All the arrangements of the teaparty were artistically appropriate, aud lovely flowers were set about the charming rooms. The hostess, ,cho wore a beautiful heliotrope Empire frock over a lace blouse, recited, and several of the guests sang. Miss Otterson wore white muslin and embroidery and a white hat. An amusing little talo was told of a New Zealand woman who, while in Melbourne, was induced to read a paper before the Congress of^, Women, then in session. She had never done anything like this before, but had always keenly interested herself in Dr. Truby King's campaign, and her paper was received with much appreciation. Afterwards a dear old lady, one of the delegates, complimented her. "But," she added gravely, "the bird-of-paradise plumes in your hat str ick a discordant note. They were altogether too worldly I" A very pleasant little tea-party took place yesterday on board H.M.S. Encounter. Among the guests were Lady Ward, Mrs. Tuson, and Mrs. Fyler. The gala-day at Henly-on-Yarra must have been an affaii\ not soon forgotten. The walks and drives in the avenue, by which people reached the promenade and house-boat enclosure, are for miles a blaze of colour. On the lawn a band played, and each houseboat, elaborately decorated, was 1 a picture. The red cross flags floated over the Medical Congress barge, which was- a mass of red bloom and green foliage, with balls of red roses hanging from each of the archways made by the bulwarks. The Australian Club boat was all white and blue, the woodSvork close to the water's edge being massed with arum-lilies. Another boat was covered with climbing roses, and another had wreaths of small yellow roses and chestnut-brown curtains. The , vice-re-gal house-boat was aIJ white, except for royal blue curtains and a border of red azaleas round the upper deck. Each boat, at night, had a band, and as one two-step ceased another would take it up. Iwo girls in a canoe wore the prettiest blue and pink river bonnets, "like an 1830 coal-scuttle with long gauze veils falling over the back. A party of ■ medical students were dressed as American Indians and pirates. The other day the fair wearer of a hat of mammoth size, plumed witli feathers of a gigantic breadth and length, stepped into an open London taxicab. Tho weather was fine when the motor started, but presently a drenching shower came on, and the "fare" called to the chauffeur to clom> the cab. Her behest was obeyed, and all went merrily once more. When she came to her journey's end the lady found that phe and her hafc could not possibly get outside the cab — in fact, tho protruding feathers caught in the doorway — and the chauffeur had to throw the hood down before i a release could be effected. To such a state of exaggeration has the millinery of the autumn arrived ! "Oh, the hats !" writes a correspondent in Paris, and "Oh, the hats !" echoes London. What with their six feet of circumference and theh' plumage that rears itself "on high in a truly forbidding manner, or that branches out in all directions to the east and west, they are a menace not only to the husband's purse but to his eyesight. Yet he pays, and pays cheerfully, though, tears rain from his injured optic. For is not this hat quite the fashion, and is not his wife completely satisfied with her appearance in it ? Writing on Professor and Mrs. Allen'sparty a* Melbourne University; a lady aays : — "There are some beautiful women among our doctors' wives. They were all at this party, in their most fascinating frocks. The women doctors themselves are not too keen on worldly dress, but Dr. Helen Sexton looked quite striking in a classical cloak of dark blue covering a white dress. In a mystical light quite a thousand well-dressed women trailed pale silky draperies. The men , were sombre silhouettes. Gowns and hoods were taboo, and in their conventional black and gleaming white attire they looked like a herd of melodrama villains. The dull black crash >hat of every import-ant medico from far

and near was collected there. What became of the conglomerate patient this last week it's hard to say; but he probably died, or got quite well. It was a great chance for those patients who had been on a fair way to recovery. They were left free from interruption." And, talking of such things, another lady mentions that a certain girl doctor, who is at present attending the Medical Conference, is about to throw up the medicine bottle and the amputating instruments in favour of the domestic sausage machine. She does this at the earnest request of a brother in the profession. In a pause of the Women's Conference work Dr. Arthur handed over a number of letters from English women who were said to be desirous of emigrating to Australia, and to thes© enquirers 'Miss Watson will reply, One girl who wrote 6aid that she and her sisters lived in a village of 800 inhabitants, and there wasn't an unmarried man in the population. There were several families, seven strong, of grown girls, nice young women who would come under the awful designu. tion of "ladies." The writer further explained that domestic service for her and her girl friends would mean ostracism in their own country, bnt they would willingly undertake that or nurserygovernessing in Australia. She wanted information and guidance. An Australian presswoman thinks that there must be thousands of this sort of girl in caste-ridden England, and if the league will but send Miss Watson and her friend "Mrs. Smith" there to yard them for Australia, that country will forgive the league for some of the horribly fool'sh papers that wei-e perpetrated here under its name, and which it couldn't e-ven read intelligently. Miss Harper, a lady missionary, who has returned to Sydney, consideis that the women are making great progress in Japan. "We try to influence them thi'ough the hostels, which we establish to reach the- factory girls. The factories are dreadful places for girls. They ar© po terribly underpaid. There ar© no mission schools in Japan, as the Government has brought public education to such a high pilch, and undertakes all that kind of thing. English is almost universal in Japan. I addressed a women's meeting at Osaka in my own tongue. There were about 300 women present, and I needed no interpreter." Miss Elizabeth A. C. White, president of the Dressmakers' Protective Afisociation, who talked on the now fashions to 300 dressmakers from all parts of the country at the opening sessions of the association's convention in tho Masonic Temple, New York, exhibited something like forty Paris gowns, all different, and when any one asked her which was the latest style her invariable reply was : "They all are. There never was a season when the styles were so unsettled. The sheath gown is not stylish," she added. "It cannot become popular. It was not originated by any of the important houses in Paris, and has never been worn by persons of refinement." The long-suffering Persian poet Omar has been parodied again, this time by Mary B. Little, in her "Rubaiyat of a Hufty Husband." The husband&regrets that his wife has caught the -craze : — On Christmas day a good Friend did present My Wife a Book; no doubt with best intent. Tho "Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam" 'twas. Little I dreamed the Woe of its Advent. She soon possessed the dreadful Omar Fad, Which other Husbands 1 have learned think Bad. But unlike other Pads which now^are Past, Thin one has power to make mo very Mad. The 29 quatrains in the book are devoted to the recital of his woe. 'His wife deserts her duties for the poetry and he finds himself neglected — [ Now all the years that we have wedded been Not once had Demon Jealousy crept in Until this Omar — Dead Eight Hundred Years; Did come, and her Affection from me Win. The author has parodied the feeling aa well as the form, and the result is a clever little book.