MAINLY FOR WOMEN

Greymouth Evening Star, 3 December 1929, Page 3

MAINLY FOR WOMEN

ITEMS OE INTEREST '

/ (Notes by

Marjorie)

MAKING of ice cream. KNOWN FOR CENTURIES. Ice cream, the popular summer refresher, is said to have been known for centuries. In 1777, an advertisement of a man named Philip Lenzi read: "Sweetmeats, preserves, maririalade, jellies, Ice cream may be had almost any day. Also ice for refreshing wine.” In Biblical times, states an overseas paper, snow and ice were used to cool wines. Marco ‘Polo, returning to Europe from Japan in the fifteenth century served the Asiatic delicacy to his friends for thri first time. But they did not know the delights of peach melbas, fruit sundaes and ice cream sodas. Having heard of water ices made in Italy, Catherine de Medici in 1550 -ordered them to be manufactured in her, own kitchen. The Italians were early masters in the preparation of the create, but it was left to France to give it its present name. It was formerly known as “cream ice” or “butter ice.” About 1774, a French chef engraved his master’s coat-of-arms upon a mould of chilled cream, which he served on sultry August afternoons. The Due de Chartres, upon viewing the frozen masterpiece, cried out: “Oh, it is ice cream.” A negro, Augustus Jackson, who lived in Philadelphia about 1832, seems to have been one of the first to make ice cream really popular. He and his family charged about 5s per quart and had no difficulty in selling all they made. They were eventually unable to meet the public demand for ice cream.

JAPANESE LOVE-MAKING. In some districts of Japan the natives have a remarkable custom in connection with window- gardening. In houses wherein reside one or more daughters of a marriageable age an empty flower pot, of an ornamental character, is encircled by a ring, and suspended from the window or veranda by three light chains. The Juliets of Japan are, of course, ? attractive, and their Romeos as anxious as those of other lands. But, instead of serenades by moonlight and other delicate ways of making an impression it is etiquette for the Japanese lover to approach the dw-elling of his lady bearing some choice plant in his hand, which he boldly proceeds to plant in the empty vase. This takes place at a time when he is fully assured that both mother and daughter are at home, neither of whom, of course, is at all conscious that the young man is taking such a liberty with the flower pot outside their window. It is believed that a young lover so engaged has never been seen by his lady. This act of placing a pretty plant in the empty flower pot is equivalent to a formal proposal to the young lady who dwells within, and this Eastern fashion is a most delicate and harmless way of proposing to a lady. The youthful gardener, having settled this plant to his mind, retires, and the lady is free to act as she pleases. If lie is the right man she takes every care of his gift, waters it, and tends it carefully with her own hands, that all the world may see the donor is acce’ptefl as a suitor. Tsut if he is riot a favourite, pr if stern parents object, the poor plant is torn froth the vase, and the next morning lies limp and withered on the veranda or on the path below.

BATTLE WITH AGE. THE FOLLY OF KEEPING YOUNG. Sixty-five million pounds a year spent in this country alone on cosmetics and hail- culture! It makes you think, does it not? (writes GeialdGould, in the London ‘Sunday Chronicle.’) But, like so many things, unless it makes you thing twice, it may easily make you think wrong. It may cause you to jump to the conclusion that women are an extravagant and selfish sex —unless you remember that* the country’s cosmetic bill is considerably less than & quaiter of its drink bill, which is incurred mainly by men. It may cause you to suppose that there is a lot of money lying about to be had for the asking—unless you remember that the gigantic expenditure of sixty-five millions has to .be divided up among a good many million women and girls.

Actually, the average feminine expenditure on cosmetics cannot work out at appreciably more than eighteenpence a week; and, since maiij rich women spend big sums in this way, there must, to keep the average at that figure, be very many women who spend nothing. & All the same, sixty-five million pounds is a lot of money. And I am told that the American statistics are even more startling. I almost feel that I could make those up for myself. “The lipsticks used annually at Hollywood,” one might say, “would, if placed end to end, reach from here to Mars.” Or, more appropriately, perhaps, to Venus.

It is certain, anyhow, that far more is now spent on cosmetics than was spent a few years ago. It is certain that the expenditure is increasing rather than otherwise. Nor’is this the only sign of a new attitude towards the incapable problem of youth and age. . ' . No longer are people content to give up, early in life, the battle against time They know that time will win in tlie long run, but they have decided to make the run as long as possible. . An admirably sporting attitude. Mothers of families are not content nowadays to become back-numbers: they are determined to go on being girls until they are grannies! They use cosmetics, and they keep their figures. The latter often takes much more time than the foimei it requires will, determination, persistence. As was long ago observed, it is easier to make up ypur face than to make up your mind. On the whole, no doubt, the change is for the better. It was Mr Bernard Shaw, who, in ‘John Bull’s Other Island,’ attributed the charm of Irish girls to the fact that they ate extremely little. He contrasted them with their English sisters, whom he accused of “wolfing down from three to five meals a day.” But that was in 1907. You would have to wander pretty far in 1929 to find an English maiden “wolfing” five meat meals a day—or even three.

SUICIDE BY SLIMMING. Yes, the change is fdr thfe better. But here again there are two sides to it. Moderation in eating and enthusiasm fox’ exercise are all very well; but yoxx caxx eat too little and exercise too much. We read frequently of fanatxcs who have starved themselves to death in the sacred cause of slimness, oxruined their health by trying too violently to be healthy. There is soxriethirig grotesque, and. indeed, definitely evil, in that coritxadiction. It is no use preserving your youth if you are not alive to enjoy it' It is lunacy to throw away the unnixh vmi have bv clutching after

more! We must distinguish between banting and casting. And, in the end, what is it all for? To remain young! To extend a little longer that period of bloom arid hope, which in any case in a few years must be over! Is not the emphasis bn,this particular aspect of life a little absurd? . , , It is, of course, better to be fit and active at forty than dull and sluggish at forty. But it is a mistake to delude yourself into the belief that you are by this . means remaining twenty. And why, in the name of all that is logical arid sensible, should you remain twenty, or want to? It is very nice for the young to be young. Youth is their proper state, with all its joys—arid incidentally all its drawbacks; but it is not the proper state for the rest of us. if it is nice for the young to be young, why on earth is it not pleasant for the middle-aged to be middle-aged? Speaking as a man who is middleaged and not ashariied bf it, I simplv cannot understand why. the fact that J and my contemporaries were born in the ’eighties should au’toinatically make us less virtuous, less useful, or less happy than we should be if we had come into the world twenty years The old used to make a virtue of being old. Nbw the young—and for that riia'tter, the old as well—make ;a virtue of being young. The brie attitude is tis unreasonable and unseasonable as the other. We ought, as Stevenson Said, to travel deliberately through our

'ages. ! - when I merit a man of sixty, I. do ridt despise Kim for being sixty. Possibly, he does not walk as fast as I do; biit possibly he thinks faster!. . The sensible course is to jlldge him by whether his sixty years have been .spent usefully arid fibri’ouraßly, not by their mere number. , To want to be young as Well as old is greedy, and | prevents us from growing old gracefully. Gracefully or not, we have to grow bld somehow. No cosmetics can cover up the fact, nd illusions disguise it. There ;caii be no disgrace in a condition whidh is universal. : , Buf I am hot suggesting that we should merely bow to the inevitable. I am suggesting, not' .that wb should “make the best of it’” (which usually meahs making the ,worst of- it), but that we should make. of .it something positively arid constructively good. No time of life is in itself better or •frb’rse, than ariy ’other. Let us give uf) 'pretb'hdirig, arid get on with tjie job of living! That is to say,/of growing cjkl,