| OCR Text |
Show , CHARACTER AND STOCKINGS. The Trite Philosophy Hidden In Hose Put On by Artful Women. . If there is a bashful young man about to read this article, 'he had better skip it. It may cause him infinite harm to know what lam about to write. . If-, he - xnce' finds that the feminine stocking is an unerring un-erring index tS the nature of "the wearer,-, who knows to what extremes he may go in his wild search after truth? The trembling trem-bling innocent of yesterday may be metamorphosed met-amorphosed into a 1xld bad man who haunts the avenue every ; wet or windy day. Let him stop before he goes any deeper into the subject. Let him hesitate hesi-tate before he tastes of the forbidden fruit this article, to-wit which will throw before him, in vivid colors and in its true light, that mystery of woman's dress the stocking! Let him pause and consider, con-sider, I say, before he dares to read what I am about to make known. Let him pass his eye sternly to the next column. Let him shun this screed as if it were a book-keeper(Chestnutese for adder), and keep his mind free from the1 unholy knowledge. WThat ! You won't ? Then don't blame me for the consequences that's all ! An eminent literary light and a shrewed observer of humanity (why should I conceal con-ceal his identity) ? It was the author of the thrilling Hatchet serial, "A Queer Case," once remarked in my hearing that he could immediately tell the character char-acter of any female whose stockings he might see. I have been since then wonderfully won-derfully amazed at the justice of this man's assertion. Not the face nor the eyes, nor the frock gives half as clear an insight into the feminine nature as the stocking ! Many years of laborous study have I given to the subject, and they only go to prove the truthfulness of this remark. re-mark. The outcome of my studies may be given to the public in the following brief statement : Striped stockings Young man, beware be-ware of the owner of striped stockings ! The gaudier the stripes, the more she should be shunned. She is a lion, seeking seek-ing whom qhe may devour. She is the ice cream girl, the soda water girl, th e fried oyster girl. She is the girl who wants you to take her to the theater, to the skating rink, to the National rifles' fair. And if you won't go with her, she will give you the g. b., and go with somebody some-body else. Ah, my young friend, the sirens should "be painted with striped stockings, and I am surprised that Ulysses Ulys-ses never said a word about it in his narrative. nar-rative. - Blue stockings, As a newspaper man I ought not to say much against bas bleu. The blues have very little beauty as a rule, but they make up for it in wit. If you have a good level head and are not very slow in repartee, you may go with impunity with the blues. Otherwise you had much better stay away. You might lose your heart to them twenty times over and they would only laugh at you. You may not find the fact mentioned in An-thon, An-thon, but it is my private belief that Minerva wore stockings of a beautiful azure. Pink stockingsJust wait until you see Nanon ! At present you are supposed to know nothing of the ballet or chorus girls. Black stockings About black or brown stockings I have little to say. Their wearers are good and modest, pure and refined women. If heaven sends you a black or brown stockinged angel in the matrimonial lottery, you ought to make the rest of your life an uninterrupted Thanksgiving day. " Red stockings No matter how nice your Dulcinea may be, if Bhe be partial to red stockings, she is a3 much to be dreaded as the girl with red hair. If you, with the characteristic blindness of young men, heed not this warning, remember it when in due course of time you kick against a new spring bonnet. In the tempest that follows, and in the subie-quent subie-quent calm, when you collect your remains re-mains together, remember this warning and what it would have saved you. As ;Anacreon but too truly says in his little "Song of the Broken Head :" Of stockings red and auburn hair I tell thee, Phocris, to be aware. White stockings A white-stockinged woman is either an old maid or one who careth not for the esteem of men. She who wears white stockings has no poetry in her soul. For her the soaring flood of music from a quivering bird is as the chattering of a crow ; the glorious hues f of a crowded garden, inferior to the beau-I beau-I ties of a gaudy bit of calico. The swirling rush of fleecy clouds over the gaunt, ap- pealing, naked arms of the moaning, shivering trees but a sign Of a windy day. j The white-stockinged woman is so ulless. J Washington Hatchet. ' . ' |
