THE CHOICE OF STATIONERY.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 9317, 18 August 1908, Page 3

THE CHOICE OF STATIONERY.

Most women like good stationery, and it is an undoubted fact that we judge our correspondents by their note^ paper. But there are fashions in stationery as well as in hats, and so the advice given on the matter by a contributor to the " Sydney Daily Telegraph", .may be found useful. " The choice of colour depends very much on the taste of the writer. The stationers say they sell quantities of azure, a blue so pale as to be almost white; of silurian, that greyish blue which is very familiar ; and turquoise, a most pronounced blue. These are the favourites, but white is always right. The kind of paper most liked is rough plain-surfaced (not creaii-laid), and with edges that look a* if they had be&n torn off. The envelopes are also rough-edged. This is good linen paper, and hence the rough edges. Square envelopes, of course, are always used for private letters and notes, except where the wallet-shaped is preferred. Letterettes, sold in blocks, with paper and envelope all in one, are very much in use, but should not be utilised to answer an invitation. The separate sheet of paper and square envelope should be taken for the above purpose, for longer letters to absent friends, and for English and foreign correspondence, where postage is a consideration, the blocks of thin single sheets are almost ousting the double sheets of foreign note-, which used to hold sway. For these are the opaque envelopes, -which are light. "It is usual now to have the name of one's house embossed on both notepaper and envelopes. For this purpose, the full address is best, except where it runs into- three lines, which looks clumay. If the paper and' envelopes are embossed the same way, the same stamp does for both, and this is a slight saving, as a stamp 1 costs half a guinea. That is almost the only cost, as the charge for •embossing the paper is trifling. It adds greatly to the appearance of a note if it is o'ii embossed I paper. Monograms are going out, though stationers say that they emboss | sometimes address and monogram on the same sheet, but this savours of pretentiousness, and all stationery should be as unpretentious as possible. Anything showy is in ve/y bad taste. Graphologists, as they stjle themselves, tell character 1 from handwriting, and there is nothing out of the way in that claim. It is quite easy to judee . a " woman by the 6tyle of note she writes. Handwriting tells its own tale, if education has been neglected. Th c wording of the epistle gives the key to the writer's disposition, just as the stalling reveals a cultivated mind or the reverse. In fact, nothing gives a woman away like a letter. You often hear it said, What a very nice note that disagreeable Mrs A. writes. Isn't' it strange? showing that, as a rule, one would expect a disagreeable woman to write disagreeable notes. And, as a l'ule, shedoes, unless she has undergone an especially diplomatic training. • "To save stationery, of which, in the case of small notes, fully two-thirds is waste-paper, correspondence cards were introduced, but these, I am told, are going out gradually. Fewer embossings than formerly are done of these cards. They have been replaced by embossed single sheets. Answers to invitations, or formal condolences, can be written on these ©ingle sheets, which, of course, must be specially cut, an 3 not be merely the torn off half of a double sheet of notepaper. That would imply a poverty-stricken state of the domestic exchequer. Invitations .are comparatively seldom sent out in writing nowadays. The telephone has usurped the place of the informal note, and formal invitations are always done by the stationer. Just as invitations have become less formal than of yore. so replies are much more casual. There are many notes to which no answers are needed, except when a reason must be given for non-acceptance. Afternoon teas and the like need not be accented formally. The hostess, unless R.S.V.P. h& -on tho note, will take it that her guests are co-mins unless they write to say they cannot." About SO, OOO tons of dufjt and refuse are taken away in barges from London | every yea-r.