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Show DRESS MAD. Behold her at eleven. Her limbs unfettered by the long skirts of conventionality, she runs, she romps, she slides on the ice ponds, she rolls hoop, she kicks, she runs races and is as fresh and as fleet of foot as the boys. Her appetite is good, her cheeks rosy, and her movements unconsciously graceful. Behold her again at twenty. No more does she run or jump, or roll hoop, run races or slide on the ice, it is not "proper" now or ladylike, and she couldn't if she would, for she is fettered by long skirts, tight shoes and tighter stays. Her movement has no longer the freedom and unconscious grace of childhood, for now when she walks abroad she walks to be looked at, which now in her estimation is the main object of walking. She is already in delicate health, and has a doctor who prescribes expensive advice and proscriptions for her and ascribes her complaints to anything and everything but the real cause. That is simply the fettering of her body with fashionable clothes. Physically she is now a prisoner. The doctor advises travel, but he doesn't advise her to take off and keep off her fashionable fetters. She wouldn't do so if he did, and he wouldn't advise her if he knew it would bring relief, for she would no longer believe in a doctor who would make her dress like a guy; and being dressed like a "guy" is different from the style prescribed by a Paris modiste. Diana never could hunt in a trailing skirt, narrow, tight, high-heeled garters and a pinched corseted waist, but Diana with a belted tunic and unfettered limbs would be bounced on Broadway by the nearest policeman. Dressing for health and freedom of limb and body is one thing, and dressing for fashion quite another. A man could not endure the pinching and encumbrances peculiar to the feminine attire for an hour, and a pretty spectacle he'd make rushing about in such during business hours. Yet the "weaker sex" wear double the encumbrances of the so-called stronger. To "dress" at all after the style uses up half a woman's time and two-thirds of her strength. - N. Y. (New York) Graphic. |