Fashions and Furbelows

Star (Christchurch), Issue 17037, 10 May 1923, Page 4

Fashions and Furbelows

Notes £$ Special Contributors

LOVE AND LOOKS.

(By

Donis Keegan.)

When she first meets him she will probably form some definite opinion of his looks. If he has done no more than hand her tea and offer her- sandwiches and cakes, she will, if she keeps a diary, write “ A.G. appears to be a very plain young .man and quite uninteresting.”

A week later he has been making himself very agreeable to her on tne tennis courts. He lias praised her pia\ and admired her hat She tells her mother that “He has really a remarkably nice lace and is so interesting. He plays an awfully good game of He «.« at tlie next dance to which she goes, hut is so busy all evening that he has hardly noticed her; but, of course, if he had known she would be there, he would not have tilled his programme ! ” She is talking to a friend as he fox trots by. - Don’t you think that man looks very supercilious and conceited? He’s really nothing to look at, but he thinks he’s an Adonis,” she A molith later she is writing to a school friend, announcing her engagement. His photograph stands before her on the writing table. “ I do wish you could see hint,” she writes. “ He’s not a bit that ordinary type of goodlooking man with very regular features. 1 always loathed them. He has such a strong lace, a firm mouth and magnificent, intellectual eyes.” They have moved into their new bungalow alter the honeymoon, and she is handing him his breakfast coffee. “You beautiful creature,” she whispers, “I could just sit and gaze at A year later she finds there are many other people about —interesting band at dinner, “J do wish you hadn’t shaved off your moustache. You know you haven’t a very strong mouth: and, for goodness sake. don’t wear such low collars. With your long neck you are the last person who should do so. 1000 YEARS OF DRESS. The Thousand Years of Dress Section in the Woman’s Exhibition at Olympia, England, is extraordinarily fascinating. Clothes, say what you will, are perennially interesting ; but they are more — they* are history. A thousand years takes us back, nearly, to the period of the battle of Hastings, where, at the first step we meet Edith, sister of King Harold, to show us what women wore at that historic time. Primitive as the times were, woman, true to the eternal feminine, had managed to evolve for herself garments whose beauty and gracefulness are hardly surpassed even to-day. Edith and her companion, a Norman and a. Scottish girl, are charming, and even extraordinarily modern. .Indeed, the style of their costume is more pleasing to the eye to-dav than the leg-of-mutton sleeve which so many of us still remember, or that “ early and almost trained skirt, and its indes-

eribably comic air. -which is only about thirty years old. Between the battle or Hastings and the dawn of the “tailor-made” what almost endless; history do wo find! England in history and in fiction is represented. "We pass from Mary Queen of Scots, sad-faced and sweet, in her black velvet and characteristic cap, to Queen Elisabeth, blazing with jewels, brilliant as gorgeous silks and brocades could make her, and, let us whisper it. rather gaudy in her taste and slightly overdressed ! Yet be it remembered that the value oi the exhibition is that the attire reproduced is historically correct. It is interesting to note about the Elizabethan group how the “farthingale,” or wide wire hoop round the hip gradually developed into the crinoline of our grandmothers. Beside the Queens, which include Henrietta Maria, wife of the ill-fated Charles 1., exemplifying the earlv Stuart fashions, we have Beatrix Esmond, heroine of TWkeray’s famous novel, and Nell Crwynn. with her basket of oranges, the orange vendor who lived to be the idol of a Court and a King, and who induced Charles 11. to found the Koval Hospital at Chelsea for the benefit of disabled soldiers. She is here with the Duchess oi Devonshire, whose beauty inspired three of England's great artists to jjaint her portrait. The dear ladies of “ Mrs G ask ell's masterpiece of genre fiction, are represented also, to recall to us the days of Waterloo and “ *dde curl*" and “ pattens.” Mrs "Bloomer and her disciples are not forgotten, and one recalls the fierce battles which raged over the “immodesty” of reform**! dress which terrified women of the early nineteenth century. Everv dav thousands of women are studying the ethics of dress and beautv „t Olvmpia. Not only are the greatest creators of dress displaying their gowns, but trained mannequins demonstrate bow io wear beautiful clothes. Beauty specialists and dress designers nt#v be perfect in their work, tut the whole effect may be spoiled if the wearer does not know bow to out on her lovelv garments, or errs in choosing the right colour effect. These and a hundred and one essen tial secrets of being well dressed, are visits the Woman's Exhibition. Beauty specialists, colour experts, and the world’s greatest dress authorities, unite placing their expert knowledge at j her service.

HARD FOOD FOR BABY.

Tradition may be useful in man, rases, but wlifli it comes to the rearing ~f a healthy baby, old legends go sadly astrav. One .if the most pernicious is the superstition that a baby needs to he fed on bread-and-milk. A “close second " is the idea that a small child needs to In- rocked to sleep. Now why. when a baby is presented with something to grind and masticate lood. should he he gieen a food that requires no rile" mg f < ontmoit sense should teach its that the sign ot a toot-li is the 'sign mat the stomach is now in a position to digest crisp foods. fine of the chief reasons for infantile illnesses is starch poisoning. Before raev.h are cut »n infant secretes saliva, but it lacks the essential to digest starch Therefore starchy foods are poison to the toothless babe. A stow I poison, if is true, not a mortal one an d yet delicate health m later child, hood and in adult years can be traced hack to this very slow poisoning by undigested starch. Your baby may not appear to suffer if you give him soaked biscuits or bread-and-milk before he lias got a tooth, but. he is suffering, and will suffer in years to come. Therefore, when baby lias cut two teeth opposite to each other, he can be given a crust of bread and butter. Watch him at first to see that he does not take 100 much into Ins mouth. Instead of bread-and-milk, gn ° nun a crus-t ot bread-and-butter and a cup of warm milk. Instead of bread soaked in broth, give a few- spoonfnls of broth and then a nibble from a crust ; instead of biscuits and milk let baby drink his milk and nibble a list’d biscuit. r l he teeth he cuts will be straight teeth, white teeth, healthy teeth, doing the work for which thev were intended, instead of being *• idle soldiers of the body.” t