It would be astonishing if the taste of our women were different, considering the way clothes are eternally being dangled before their eyes.Leading papers publish illustrated supplements devoted exclusively to the subject of attire, thus carrying temptation into every humble home, and suggesting unattainable luxuries.Windows in many of the larger shops contain life-sized manikins loaded with the latest costly and ephemeral caprices of fashion arranged to catch the eye of the poorer class of women, who stand in hundreds gazing at the display like larks attracted by a mirror! Watch those women as they turn away, and listen to their sighs of discontent and envy.Do they not tell volumes about petty hopes and ambitions?
I do not refer to the wealthy women whose toilets are in keeping with their incomes and the general footing of their households;that they should spend more or less in fitting themselves out daintily is of little importance.The point where this subject becomes painful is in families of small means where young girls imagine that to be elaborately dressed is the first essential of existence, and, in consequence, bend their labors and their intelligence towards this end.Last spring I asked an old friend where she and her daughters intended passing their summer.Her answer struck me as being characteristic enough to quote: "We should much prefer," she said, "returning to Bar Harbor, for we all enjoy that place and have many friends there.But the truth is, my daughters have bought themselves very little in the way of toilet this year, as our finances are not in a flourishing condition.So my poor girls will be obliged to make their last year's dresses do for another season.Under these circumstances, it is out of the question for us to return a second summer to the same place."I do not know how this anecdote strikes my readers.It made me thoughtful and sad to think that, in a family of intelligent and practical women, such a reason should be considered sufficient to outweigh enjoyment, social relations, even health, and allowed to change the plans of an entire family.