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Sun (Christchurch), Volume I, Issue 107, 11 June 1914, Page 6

"Despite the present vulgarities, the fashions are making a hesitating return to virtue," commented a cable message from London the other day. Why '' virtue'' will- not be exactly clear to the man in the street, who would substitute some such word as "commonsense. '' These cabled fashion notes; have never been so prolific as in the last twelve months, and it would be difficult to imagine (with most of them) anything less worth the expense of a mes sage across the world.- The average man will not interpret the latest information as an indication of the decline of the freak fashions. Fashion is as dicta torial and tyrannical as the generality of women ! are subservient. When fashion decrees the bare neck at-, tire, mere years will not iKevem matronly women and lean elderly misses from participating in- the Hew mode,: ; The slit skirt was designed —who can doubt it—for the display of a well proportioned leg, with preferably an exquisite, turn of ankle, but when fashion called to the youthful and the shapely, what self-respecting daine or spinster would advertise her age (or her physical shortcomings) by refusing to toe the line? It is enough for a Avoman witli aspirations to know she is 40 odd without having to add to her heartaches fby confirming the suspicions of her friends. When the mode orders; the collarless blouse, '' swtfet and twenty'' (to quote the cable), and "fair and forty" (again we rely on the cable) arc inextricably intermingled in ■ the rush for the modiste's eye. So mere man smiles behind his hand at an elderly "girl" displaying a neck that the years have furrowed sadly, and the cynics mock in secret at a dowager with more money than taste trying to emulate the ingenue in a Marcus Stone robe of flowing folds. Fashion certainly adds to the gaiety of nations, but she must cause many of her devotees, who have lost roundness of limb, or who have too much roundness of body, some rebellious thoughts in private.