Spoilt Their Fingers.

Otago Witness, Issue 2369, 27 July 1899, Page 52

Spoilt Their Fingers.

" You will often hear people say that the typewriter is a" great boon to the blind," remarked a gentleman, who knows a great deal about the business, " and so it is in a certain sense of the word. It is comparatively easy for a blind person of average intelligence to learn the lay of the keys, for, as a matter of fact, the ordinary operator never looks at them anyhow, and after that a, great vista of amusement and usefulness opens up.

" The sightless operator can beguile the darkness by keeping an elaborate diary or by writing s book or engaging in lots of correspondence — in fact, there are a hundred and one ways in which the writing much! ne makes life brighter and more cheerful for such unfortunates. But, oddly enough, all these advantages are to a conoiderable extent offset by a little bit of stubborn fad which was overlooked by the original enthusiasts. " 1 refer tr tha hardening of the finger tips which forms one of the inevitable and unavoidable results of working on any machine. Now the finger tips are the eyes of the blind, and anything that affects their exquisitt sensitiveness is a disaster. '" If the skin becomes tho least callous i^ is impossible lo read the raised-letter books st many of the blind folk who nad been hammering nwav on typewriters and getting some pleiibiirt out of them wore obliged to ptop. "

The Progress of Women's Dress. " Tho Art of Dress" is- the title given by Marie A. Bclloc tt her interview with Georges Pilotelle in the Lady's Realm for May. The artist and designer oi fashions told her : — " At nc time in the world's history have ther* been such beautiful clothes as are made and worn nowadays." He thinks it absurd tr talk of the Second 35mpire as the zenith of elegance. Dress has certainly advanced in expensiveneas. WogiejD whs> would have spent an their dress

£100 a year when he was young, now spend 10 times ar much. Once he designed £40.000 wortr of costume, for one lady;" and at another time a pair of stockings to cost £100 ; and a tea-gowr. costing £1700. He laughed at the notion that women make the fashions : " Prom time immemorial men have always had the designing, and even the making, of ieminine garments j while till the end of the sixteenth century only mer. tailors oi Paris were giver the privilege oi building clothes for both sexes, and this right even extended to corsets." • In artificial flowers: "All the fine felossomk are the work of men, and the einbioideries, which now play so great a part m dress, are prepared and drawn by men : and in the great tailoring houses, only the skirt hands are women." It is interesting to note that this fashionable designei predict: the general abandonment of the skirt. He says : " I consider a modified form of the divided skirt, or if I may whisper it, of Turkish dress, the feminine costume of the future." He seriously believes that the dress of the two sexes will tend to become more alike- as the centuries i pass. | i