SKIRTS PROHIBITED.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XIX, Issue XIX, 30 October 1897, Page 584

SKIRTS PROHIBITED.

RATIONAL DRESS PILGRIMAGE FROM LONDON. (From the “ London Daily Mail.”) To-day those who want to see how the rational costume appears at its l>est on the lady bicyclist should look out for the departure from London of the delegates to the conference at Oxford of ‘ The Supporters of the Rational Costume.’ The ladies should create a dazzling effect, for according to a notice which has lieen issued by the convener of the gathering, Mr .1. D. Ainsworth, three prizes will l>e given to the three ladies wearing the most approved costumes. Who will lie the venturesome Paris who will undertake to award the apples to the rational localities is not yet known. Mr Ainsworth has convened the gathering in the names of a numloer of clubs, including the Lady Cyclists,’ the Ladies’ Rational Dress, the Ladies’ South West, the Mowbray House, the Vegetarian, the Western Rational Dress, ami the Vorosbi. The Viscountess Haloerton has consented to act as president for the occasion, and, among others, the following ladies and gentlemen have loeen invited to attend :— Lady Colin ('ampbell, Lady Randolph Churchill, Mrs Sarah Grand, Lady Richardson, Laxly Henry Somerset, Miss Eva Maclaren, Miss J. Harrison, The Countess

of Warwick, Lord Coleridge, Colonel Saville, Mr W. T. Stead.

It is compulsory ujion all ladies attending this congress to wear rational dress. This is the only condition which is made, and it will lie enforced rigidly. ‘Skirts will not lie tolerated under any circumstances,’ is the declaration in the marching orders ; and in view of this emphatic pronouncement it is painful to imagine what might happen to any skirts which might dare to profane the occasion by apjiearing on the scene.

In order that there may lie no sort of mistake alsiut the matter, Mr Ainsworth has written to say that * skirts will lie entirely forbidden under any provocation, and the notion that the rider must carry a skirt to lie put on the moment the bicycle is left will receive no toleration. Of course, it is understood that all the gentlemen riders who will attend are anient supporters and advocates of the sensible costume. If we all do our liest we shall have a gathering worthy of the occasion, and give the lie to those weak-minded and piejudiced people who are fond of saying that rationalists are dying out.’ The Englishwoman lias hitherto steadily refused to bifurcate herself when she rides a bicycle, holding, it may be suspected, that a skirt divided against itself cannot stand scnitiny. Will this gathering, with its prizes for the three most approved costumes, give the rational cause a new impetus ’ Oxford has been chosen “ mainly

because of its pleasant situation on the river lietween London and Cheltenham, the two centres of the Forward Movements in women's dress in regard to cycling, ’ and not lieeause Oxford is the ‘ home of lost causes.’