LADIES' COLUMN.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXII, Issue 9775, 23 March 1895, Page 4 (Supplement)

LADIES' COLUMN.

LATEST LONDON FASHIONS. Exaggeration is the keynote of the coming styles (says a London fashion writer). Have shoulder seams been sloping downward lower and lower for the past year During the coming year they will continue to descend, until by next Christmas shoulder seam and elbow will probably coincide. Have sleeves been so broad that their wearers have had to slide through doors sideways? They are to be broader. Everything is to be exaggerated. The last) year has seen the gradual development of the skirt from a comparatively simple structure of moderate proportions into a complex affair of imposing dimensions. Next year the good work will go on. She who has been, wearing a skirt only five yards wide around the bottom will look before the twelve months is ended on eight yards as a rather meagre allowance. She who has stiffened her skirt with canvas will advance to hair-cloth, and by and by the time will come when not oven hair-cloth will suffice, but whalebone bands will be sewn into the skirt, still further to distend it. For so have the great makers of fashion decreed. In her hair also will woman continue to show how far she can carry a thing without overdoing it. For the lasb year it has drooped over the tips of her ears and been gathered in graceful twists at the back or in spiral coils at the top of her head. THE hair OF 1895

will be parted and drawn over the face, so that a goodly portion of my lady's cheek, a bib of her eyebrow, and her entire ear will have disappeared from view. Veils will be at a discount. Dusky or golden locks will suffice to hide the features. In the back the one-time graceful knot will become the mammoth bun, and the slender coil on the top of the head will grow into a sort of minaret arrangement. For in the coming year the keynote in dressing is exaggeration. There has been during the lasb few months a notable tendency towards lengthening sleeves. Any close observer will have marked that the actresses—those unfailing signs of the way in which styles are trending have been wearing sleeve? coming below the wrists, sometimes ornamented with a little Van Dyke projection, which roaches almost to the knucfelos. This means not only long sleeves, but the gradual and insidious return of the trimmed cuff. From the Van Dyke flap falling over the hand it is but a step to the flap which would fall over the hand were ik not tacked back, and from thab to every variety of cuff known throughout the history of s'.oeves is bub a little way.

THK COIJ.AR in its present condition is a thing of projections. It has large "ears," which stand onb on each side. Ib has another straight projection in the roar. It has buckles or flowers fastened in front. It is made of silk, velvet, chiffon, or anything else rich and beautiful. Ib is paving the way, both by its size and the variety of materials employed in its manufacture, for the Elizabethan collar, tho Medici collar, and all the other picturesque and ornate nock pieces of antiquity. Jewelled and gold embroidered stuffs, silks, stiff with \ silver thread and glittering with artificial gems, lace wrought with divers stones, feathers, and every conceivable rich and sumptuous thing will be used to make the picture collars of the coming year. The " ordinary" collar will continue to be a crush affair, with everlengthening side projections. The girdle will also have its share in forming the fashions of the coming year. • It will broaden out, in some cases, into a modified corselet, which will have the effect of shortening the waist and making the Empire styles more or leas popular. This will be the case particularly with evening gowns. The waistloss will rule, and overy woman whose avoirdupois will permit her to do so will indulge in a filmy gown hanging from her shoulders and drawn in below her bosom by a broad, slightly shaped basi l of heavily embroidered silk or velvet. The same rich ness of material which will characterise the picture collar will also characterise the picture belt. This prominence given to rich goods will make such things as

SLKEVKLKSS ZOUAVJS AND ETON JACK NTS popular. A sleeveless Zouave, stiff with gold thread, heavy with silk embroidery, sewn with tiny seed pearls or small stones of any sort, is as ornate and rich a thing as one can wear. Already there are a good many such jackets displayed in the shop*, and their number will be legion as the season advances. From tho organ plait to the draped skirt is not such a long distance. Only a master in the gentle art of dressmaking can make organ plaits look well. A skilful novice can drape a skirt. The organ-plaited skirts hang with so many folds and fulnesses thab the most natural thing m the world is to advance from them to draperies, and thence to overskirts. The overskirt, moreover, gives opportunity for the display of more rich materials. Brocaded petticoats or underskirts are likely to come in with the overskirt, and the coming of tho " panel" is already prophesied in the popularity of the stole. Stoles hanging from the belt to the hem of the skirt divide the skirt in a way that suggests panels at once. And panels will follow, for they afford still another opjxirtunity for the introduction of rich stuff?. Exaggeration in styles and extravagance in materials will be the most marked characteristics of the coming year. There are women who will protest, but ib will be in a still, small voice, which will nob carry far. Meantime they will tangle themselves up in yards of unnecessary material, carry about pounds of unnecessary weight, and wait for the reaction of the next year.

A WORD TO WOMEN ON WOMEN.

A tangled skein is this woman question of ours in the present day !—a skoin that well may baffle the wisest, the most liberal, the most patient. What is needed to set it right? One thing only : good and capable women. Let them call themselves what they willdoctors, lawyers, or dressmakers, or cooks ; only let us have them. Surely the two doctrines which most need to be preached to the girls of the present day are these :—l. Choose work that is beneath you rather than work that is above you. 2. Take the work that comes to hand and do it with all your might. It is not by opening up new spheres that you will best improve the position of woman ; it is by filling ably the sphere that you are in. Trite doctrines, no doubt, old as humanity itself; and doctrines, moreover, which have often been used to bolster up abuses. Thirty—twenty — years ago, I believe, many women were justified in ignoring such aphorisms. "There is another side to the question," they said; and by word and deed J they stated the other side nobly. Bub now that it has been stated, now that the point has been gained, may we not thankfully go back to tho simplor, more lovable virtues? As regards the medium, there is no longer any need to fear. The ball has been sot rolling, and will run of itself. Let us leave for a time the education, the development, the purification of men, and try to develop ourselves. —Blackwood's Magazine.

HAPPY AND HEALTHY CHILDHOOD. A child ought to be happy, and no silly fables about crying being good for it and expanding its lungs can explain the fact that crying means hunger or pain, and that the former must be fed and the latter relieved as quickly as possible. A cross baby exists either in the brain of its mother or is a testimony to her wretched mismanagement. Lungs are best expanded by the sweet nature plan of comfortable breathing, happy cooing, and later, laughter, shouting, and singing. Then a child ought to bo full of movement. A still child is cither a sick child or an unhappy one, and at whatever cost to our own nerves, we must secure to the children as much movement in their waking hours as they wish. 'J he child itself is a much better guide as to its needs for movement than a sedate adult whose restless days are in the distant past. Also a healthy child ought to want to be busy ; and nothing to do is as ruinous to the virtue of two years old as to that of 12, 20, or 50. How often children are accused of being mischievous and wicked when they are simply industrious and inventive. Of course the little one will want to do what those about him do; imitation is the faculty by which progress has evolved a Shakespere from the primeval man ; bub the most puzzling thing to a child is to be punished or scolded for doing what it sees others do as a matter of course. —The Parents' Review.