PLACE AUX DAMES.

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume II, Issue 34, 23 January 1912, Page 3

PLACE AUX DAMES.

No matter leGv pleasant the holiday ha-, bhen. or how amusing and entertaining the people one has nitt. it is alway s a delight to get hack to one’s own little corner cf the earth, and the individual comforts cf one’s home. So many of ns are feeling this at the moment that the remark is obvious to dullness, but with all

its charms Hastings air is nut conducive to originality.. and so the observation mud stand. And upon

our travels winch of us has not Wen struck by the beauty ~f our country' And wh<; m endeavouring to see th:s beauty from express windows Las not wondered, when with stiff neck and strained eyes she at last returns in despair to magazine

or book why a kindly Government has not arranged for tht windows to open just two inclirs higher, so that the lower sash should not entirely obstruct the view -! Anil why. with

three hundred passengers on board tne main trunk line express might there not be two dining cars, so that class pa.'sfengers. packed in a queue along a stuffy corridor, need not wait more than perhaps an hour for a meal, while the Inckier travellers, enjoying an unobstructed view i.ito the car. may dash unchecked for scats as they are vacated. Who is it who arranges these things? Irving. Auckland is. cf course, gone mad over Irving, though just why no one set ms exactly to know. He is Irving, and you pay six shillings for the seats, of course, and it is your duty

to say you enjoy such a treat ever

if you don’t. One cannot help feel ing that the explanation of this lies m the fact that Irving is to professionals. and to I hose who under stand the laws which govern the art

of acting, a marvellously clever performer, with all his father's intense personality, added to the quiet re straint of the present-day school:

but to the ordinary theatre-goer he is simply- an exponent of old-fashion-ed melodrama, which does not ap peal to our modern minds, lr.it appears overdrawn, theatrical and unnatural. The davs when Irving pere mad? “The Lyons Mail” ami “The Bells’’ famous were tb? day? <’ Boucicault’s dramas, ef “East Lynn.” and Warnei’s “Drink,” am’ to appri mate we have to v. adr back through years of the modern comedy drama of Omar Wild. Heniy Arthur Foucs ami all the revt ->f them, where the keynote of the work is reality, subdued cmot o-’s, .mu’ stood form. However. H. B. Irvinu’s face, voice, and family tradition give him exclusively to melodrama. so there he must remain ; and there, tr those who see> with the eve of imit.a-

tion, he is ti very great actor indeed : and he thrills you fearfully, so that you ba’e T, o idea you have beer

weeping till the lights go tin and you canno*- find your handkerchief. MissDorothea Baird is 'tic-h a charming ncr c oral:ty. and so immensely popular with everyone who kno'ws her. that one can only whisper in a very small voice indeed one s intense disappointment in her acting. Frocks and Frills.

It is astonishing how women will succeed, by persistence, in gaining the male suffrage for fashions loathed and ridiculed of masculinity ir the first stages of their introduction. The truth is. of course, that in our modern civilisation custom can reconcile ns to anything but Nature, remoteness from whom is, indeed, the keynote of our fashions. One walks up Lambton Quay in a contemplative mood, taking note of the costumes by the way. The very first conclusion arrived at is that the closely fitting skiits, so jeered at not long ago, are extremely pretty if properly worn. They were never meant to walk fast in. though. The only possibility of graceful progres sion Les in a slow ,md even gn ; t. allowing the skiit to keep its con-j tour and not c i: nk about the , in awkwaul and revealing tightness. Many girls seem to aim at a steady carriage of the body, but 'move in a most ungainly wav from the hips. The Wellington hills are bad for that soit of thing, of course, and nearly all the women there swing their arms and move their shoulders too much. Where are the results of the physical culture classes that nearly all of them belong to ? And on all the frocks are buttons. Burton-., buttons every win re. and

not a button to fasten. They are a delusion and a snare ; nearly all the tailor-mades are covered with them, and one cannot help wishing we could button ourselves into them as they lead the casual observer to suppose. The buttons are there, and the buttonholes —holeless 1 Rows and rows of tiny buttons form the trimmings of our skirts and ninon slips. From the gowns worn a- the opera house o’ nights it would appear that one may s,ti!l wear a swathing of satin, or a wisp of ninon, but it requires much fine gold in the way of fringes and hand embroideries to kt ep tbe=e comparatively inexpensive materials in position. Fringes aie perhaps first favourites as regards accessories, and they are really very pretty, though apt to give rather a Red Indian impression when overdone. A Book.

' The Red Lantern.” ly Edith Wberry. anpears at a psychological moment. The press is full of reports of the Chinese Revolution and of the views and interviews of Dr. Sun Ynt Sen. the Chinese Christian who is regarded in the Western world as the man be lend this great movement which has the appearance of being a national one. In these circumstances any b->rk dealing wit!’. Chinn is of more than usual mt-rest. But “The Ri d Lantern’’ has a peculiar aitrac tion that its chief figure is also a Cl::nr«e Christian, one Sam Whr»g.

ri>metime nhvsician to the mission in Pekin. v ho subsequently becomes a convert and re-appears the leader ami figurehead c-f the Boxer movement. Sam Wang is a great figure, and a terrible example of that terrible phenomenon, the Christian convert who has gone back to savaserv, and becomes more fanatical than his own people. The book, besides being a marvellous pageant of Oriental colour, customs and imagery, fairly throbs with the primeval passions of love and fury.