WOMAN'S PAGE.

Hokitika Guardian, 27 February 1932, Page 3

WOMAN'S PAGE.

SIMPLE FASHIONS. MODES FOR DAY DRESSES. Fashion is returning to simplicity again, at least where day dresses are concerned. Tailored suits are wellcut, but very simple. One of London’s best tailors is showing coats and skirts cut on classical lines without any pocket flaps or cuffs. These are a distinct contrast advanced military models that were seen at some of the recent dress shows, and it will be interesting to see which of the two lashions is the more popular. It is difficult to forecast the popularity of either of the modes. The military fashion is smart and original, but it will date very easily, while the plain “classical” suit is also smart and could be worn on almost any occasion. Simple shirt blouses made in heavy silk or fine woollen materials are also being worn and, as these would be ideal for wearing with either the military or classical suit, they are likely to be very popular. These blouses are particularly attractive, as they can be adapted to the individual taste. If you like to be trim, a tie is dis tinctly smart; if a little less severe effect is required, a soft silk bow may Be worn, while a large floppy crepe-de-cbine one should be the choice of those who like a “fluffy” effect. MAKE-UP MADNESS; MATCHING THE DRESS. Make-up is really, I think, becoming beyond a joke. In moderation there enothing more fascinating, but when .1 comes to matching up your frock with your eyebrows and your nails it is surely time something was done about it While shopping the other day i met a woman dressed in a petunia shade of mauve. Her frock and hat matched perfectly, but it did not stop there. Her eyebrows, eyelashes and lips all followed the same colour scheme! The latest idea in nail varnish is not to have plain, red, orange, green mauve or blue nails: they must be varnished in stripes in the colours o! your favourite football club! Cln 1 colours, however, seem to be the rage all the world over. The Scottish women hockey players, who have just returned from a tour of America, weri very amused at the teams they played in that country. The players, they told me, took great care to make up their lips to the exact colour of their club hose. They even went so far as to rub off the lipstick if it was not quite the right shade and start the process again from the beginning.

SILKEN MITTENS. RETURN TO POPULARITY, , The silken mittens of great-grand-mother’s day are returning to fashionable circles. Delightful lacy affairs are the most popular type and may bp worn with fluffy gowns. According to a firm that makes the*.’ charming accessories, it was at Ascot this year that the fashion was first resurrected. A Vom an who wanted to be quite different from everybody else wore a pair of mittens to mate!' hqr crinoßne gow)n. Tin 1 npvt dev orders began pouring in from West End shops and stores for large consignments of lace mittens, and now the fashion is definitely established.

CYNIC ON WOMEN. A FEW OF HIS EPIGRAMS. The piquant mix-up as a result of tk decree of doctor conferred in H. L Mencken, one of America’s most slash ing critics, recalls a few of his delight fill epigrams. A young woman, according to th cables, demanded that “Dr.” Menckcj should diagnose her for some ailment in the firm belief that he was a doctor of medicine, and not merely an honrr ary doctor of laws. This will he rnor. material for Mencken's cynical vein. Here are a few of his epigrams:— Men have a much hotter time of if than women. For one thing, they marry later. For another thing, they die earlier. Married life begins like a triolet. I ends like a college yell. The way to hold a husband is to go him a little bit jealous. The way V lose him is to get him a iittle bit mor jealous. The one breathless passion of every woman is to get someone married. I she is single, it, is herself. If she is married, it is Ihe woman her husband would probably marry if she died to morrow. Mali weeps to think that he will di< so soon. Woman, that she was born 41 < long ago. No man is evoY'loo old to look- a| • woman. And no woman is ever too Ini to hope that lie will look. Bachelors know more about womethan married men. If they didn't they’d be married too. The worst of marriage is that i 1 makes a woman believe that all men are just as easy to fool. The greatest secret, of happiness in lov< is to be glad that the other fellow married her. A man may bo a fool and not kino it but not ii' lie's married, \V mni'ii ii«4iui Ilv «*njoy nnnnvih" tlioi: husbands, but not when they annoy them by growing Bit.

Mite CARMEL LEROY IWuted

Progress is the process whereby the human race first got rid of its whiskers. A gentleman is one who never strikes a woman without provocation. A woman’s club is a place in which the validity of one’s philosophy is judged by the hat of its prophetess. Jn the book from which the above are quoted someone scribbled in pencil, evidently by way of challenge to Mencken : “Men would be saints if they loved God as they love women.” And if one’s memory serves him correctly, it was the same H. L. Mencken who went obediently to Hymen’s altar sometime ago. SHORTER SKIRTS. FASHIONS TO CHANGE, Long outdoor skirts are doomed and experts have decreed that fashions will lie more practical than they have been for years. Evening frocks made cf woollens of many dazzling colours, light-weight, and as fine as silk, will bo worn on lines bordering oil the Grecian. Long skirts may be seen at Ascot, but will never be used lor town wear, being replaced by trim tailored coats of j military cut over neat little frocks of walking length or tailored suits and coat frocks cut on military lines with broad shoulders. Mr Peter Russell, the fashionable designer, declares that the new fashions will oblige women to attend to their : deportment, hold their heads erect, have square shoulders and walk with an easy swinging stride instead or mincing their steps, which affected last year’s Victorian evening skirts. British woollens are being increasingly used, and evening frocks are made of lovely fine weight woollens which do not crush and are like silk or crepe do chine. They hang beautifully and will be worn over slips of thick silks, rustling like Victorian petticoats. The evening frocks will return to simple grace with a touch of Grecian influence, on long flowing lines, using as much as 20 yards of material.

INDEPENDENCE IN DRESS. WHAT CONTROLS LOVELINESS. What is beauty, and where is it? In suppressing tlie natural lines of the figure, or in exhibiting tliem ? In exploiting some, at tile expense of others? In being all curves, or simply reed-like '- In having ears and no foreheads, or foreheads and no ears? in having eyebrows shaved off almost to vanishing point, or- having them • thickened by neans of creams and lotions? Everyone of these changes have been, or is, .fashionable. Was it tor beauty’s sake that women wore the long trailing darts which a frozen hand held gracefully above the mud? And was it for beauty tlqit women presented their beauty unashamed, their bare knees, bare arms, bare necks, etc? Was it for beauty that women adopted, in pre-historic times, before the war, the melon sleeve, heavy with buckram, that bulged like a balloon from each shoulder and made the serving of dinner resemble a sudden letting down from behind high coloured hedges? Was it for beauty that lovely woman wore the spineless frock, the slit-up skirt? Was it intended to create the exact shock it did create? And was the wearer inured to any. draught in that region, in j ust the same way as she has now been inured to wearing next to no petticoat, and slip, will be most certainly mused t° wearing next to anything -hat fashion decrees? Qui sait! Most aometi dress, if not for, at least belt use of, other women in their own particular circle. It is really the gang spirit that guides them. Why elso do .li'ey insist upon wearing what even .vomaii of their acquaintance wears vithout question of its suitability?

THIS WEEK’S RECIPES. Beef Loaf. lib finely-minced beef steak, 1 cup if breadcrumbs 1 teaspoon mixed lerbs, 1 small onion (minced), 1 egg, pepper and salt. Mix well together, find with the beaten egg, and bake for an hour in some good beef dripping, ieepiiiir it well basted. ** * * Gingerbread cake, j cup sugar, cup butter, j cup trea■le, j cup milk, I dessertspoon giugoi, I teaspoon mixed spice, 1 teaspoon ground nutmeg, I teaspoon cinnamon, l •gg, | cup flour, a few nuts and lemon pool may be added. Bake one hour. ** * * Blackberry Cordial. Olio quart of blackberry juice, III) white sugar, joy grilled nutmeg, joy, ’lowderod cinnamon, joy allspice, joy of doves, I pint best brandy. Place be bbiokberrios in a stone jar and mash hem to a pulp: boil the sugar, juice, iml the spites (tii'd up in a muslin bags) or fifteen minutes, skimming well ; .lien add tlie brandy; put aside ill a ■losely-covcred jar to cool; when quite ■old. strain out the spices, and put away in bottles, seal the tops