THE LADIES’ WORLD.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXVII, Issue 2669, 26 November 1909, Page 3

THE LADIES’ WORLD.

A PLEA FOR THE GRACE OF THE PAST,

Ah Australian contemporary puts in a plea for the revival ot the grace which characterised the deportment of the women of a past era, and low there are but will agree with her views:— “The girl who swims and rows, shoots and bicycles, plays hockey, crickcty and golf, certainly has the freshness of skin and brightness of eye that are most, desirable; but how often does she carry hercelf with case and grace? The over?; development of her muscles gives her a/ certain bulkiness of figure, which is foreign to all the canons of beauty in the feminine form. The habit of resiling headlong across a hockey or cricket field does not conduce to that graceful carriage which distinguished our mothers. Do yon remember how 'Niobo' parodied tlie swinging gait of the modern girl, and how we all admired the contrasting charm with which she resumed her own natural walk

“Walking in the early' days was an art to be learned. Everyone from the nurse to the teacher and dancing mistress looked upon deportment as a study. Their charges would never have, been allowed to slouch and shuffle as the modern hobbledehoy is allowed to do almost unchecked. Stooping, like putting th-fi elbows on the table, was almost a crime, and to be punished as such; and though the bhickhoard is hardly to be advocated, the fear of it was wholesome, and no doubt saved many a girl from ruining her digestion by bonding over a boo'k or table directly after a meal. There is something, too, to be said for the old-fashion-ed step and seat contrivance, by wihicn our great-grandmother,s learned the art of entering a carriage gracefully. A little instruction on the science of climbing into a hansom cab or tram-car would not be amiss in the curriculum of the modern school girl. “No one for a moment would abandoning the modern healthy sports ■which form- such a large part of our girl’s training; but might not a l.itt'e care be given to teaching them ease and grace of deportment as well ? We would not like to see our girls walking with tiny mincing steps, but is there any need for them to stride into a drawingroom as if they wore after a cricket ball?”

- In, America the question is receiving much attention, and in sonic schools the art of poise is amongst the things which the girls must master. For this end a teacher is engaged to take classes of girls out every day' and teach them liow to walk. The lesson lasts for a couple of hours, and during that time each girl is taught how to hold her head, how to carry herself upright, throw mit her client, square her shoulders -and step gracefully. With girls who are strong and healthy from their physical culture the lessons are easily, learned, and it is said that improvement in mire riwi<3 carriage is noticeable in a very short time. THE MAN WITHOUT A HOBBY. A writer in a Sydney paper discourses eloquently on the trials of the wife wlio.se husband is without a hobby. According to this writer when this man has a holiday, he is a burden to himself and a scourge to his wife and everyone in. the house. He prowls about looking for cobwebs and dust, or squints into the bread crock, and announces that there are six ends 6f loaves in it which should he eaten —not by himself, of course. He suggests that they might make, a pudding for the children’s tea, or toast for the maids’ breakfast, and declares that the waste going on in the kitchen is scindalous. and that it has got to be stopped, oven if he has to give* up his own work and; stay at home to superintend the housekeeping himself. He complains that the whole house is a dust-heap, but when one want’s to dust in the drawing-room,-he is in there sitting in the big, delicately-tinted brocaded chair, with his feet in the mantelpiece, smoking an evil-smelling pipe, while ashes and cigarends' are to be found in all the vases, and when asked to vacate the room in the interests of cleanliness laments loudly that he cannot get a moment’s peace under his own roof, that his home is always being turned upside down, and that liis women folk make life a misery with turmoil and unrest. When one goes to make- liis bed, he is lying on' it, and when one wants to cut out a skirt on the drawing-room table, lie is sprawling over that with his newspaper spread out on it. In fact he is always slouching about the various rooms, getting in everyone’s way, anu interfering by liis hulking presence with all one’s schemes 'and plans and usual routine. The writer finishes a long list of trials endured the wife of a man without a hobby by saying that the wife of the man with a hobby lias a great many -advantages over the wife of the man without oho? When tlie first is at home, he is occupied, and ; capable of amusing himself; he is out of the way, too,\ being either-in liis garden,’ dark room, workshop, labora-. torv, or. studio; and when he is -abroad he is probably still pursuing his hobby, or discussing it with fellow enthusiasts. The man without a hobby is a nuisance at home, as lie hangs about the house all day, and "abroad is a source of anxiety for at night he becomes bored by his inability to entertain himself, and goes out to seek amusement perhaps of a doubtful character. EARTHQUAKE ECHOES. - ; , Entertaining stories in connection with the recent earthquake at Wellington will be related foV many ,a come, says a writer in' the/“Times." A girl -who had disrobed for the night and was about to get into bed. rushed into the street screaming, and' caused something of a sensation at one end of tlie city. An incident? that happened at the Opera House, shows to what extent some people carry the- conventionalities. A girl hod fainted, and a man friend who was handy, bore her out ot the building to the nearest hotel, 1 where some brandy forced down her throat, had' the effect of partially bringing her to —sufficient- at least to-; make her realise that her man friend 1 and tlm girl who. had accompanied her' to the theatre had never been introduced. “Mr: , Miss'-—!” she gasped out and then subsidised again. Some people were diverted by seeing the man who had been murdered when the- curtain fell, appear at the “no exit” door, and cast a speculative eye over the stnmpodirfg multitude. Tlie man who rushed out, of a hotel bar, leaving'afrothing glass of alp for which he had, • paid, on the counter,, and who never; returned to claim it, must have got a 1 very bad shock indeed. I hear that babv girl, born on tlie same dav as the I earthquake, is' to bo named “Wellingtonia Earthquakina.” :