Evening Star Newspaper, February 16, 1895, Page 15

15 THE EVENING STAR, SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 16, 1895-TWENTY PAGES. COMING FASHIONS Chilly to Think About, but Summer Goods Are Here, VARYING AND DELICATE COLOR SHADES Crepon is the Gown Goods and is Likely to Be. TAILOR-MADE GOWNS Writtea Exclustvely for The Evening Star. H=: Is AN ITEM, culled from a cele- brated French au- thority, that will cre- ate some little con- sternation in la mode circles: “It will take American women the usual six months to discover that the pre- eminently huge sleeves and the im- mense flaring skirts they hear such fairy stories about are not, and have not been, the vogue in Paris. Moderately large sleeves and gracefully flaring skirts, not excessively wide, have prevailed and are still la mode, and are likely to continue also to be favored by the mest celebrated ateliers in France for menths to com Think of that, will you? After we have fairly bankrupted ourselves in the purchase of material to make dress skirts,and broken our backs carrying the weight of goods around! It is just too mean for anything! Furthermore, American modistes are telling their deluded customers that skirts are growing yet wider for spring and summer wear, and that eight yards around wiil be a modest limit. The text of this celebrated French authority and its iliustrations do not agree, however, and the women are pictured in petticoats that flare like those of a ballet d. ‘Truth to tell, women do Rot pay a great deal of attention to the let- in the world. Amer! have not worn the excessively wide skirts neh authority. ecmpiained of by the F The weil-groomed woman has too much sense to go to the extreme in anything. She leaves the ultra styles to the woman who is not q sure of her position; who longs to be talked about and knows that the last new fad in dress carried to the limit wiil bring the desired end quicker than any oth method she may adopt. it is true that the skirts are going to be wider the coming season, seen the fabrics that they will be made of are so sheer and fine that you ble to draw the whole skirt our finger ring, 2nd unless a wo- to give the impression of cari- she has got to wear wide eaturi skirt ores are full of them, the new summer goods. Of course, that gives one the cold shivers, but now is a good time to study over the question of summer wns, when It is too cold to do anything Orzandy will be the craze, if the counters tell the truth, and anything pret- tier than organdy can scarcely be men- tioned. It comes in all the daintiest and most delicate shades, ard is drifted over With bouquets of blossoms that are so real looking you simost think you can smell them. Attractive Decoration. Most of the designs are large, but a few are small and delicate. A single violet, or a long-stemmed crocus with a leaf or two. The purple Iris is one of the favorites, and an exquisite half-blown moss rose is an- other that attracted universal attention. ‘These organdies are to be worn over color- ed slips, and will have a great deal of rib- ben garniture, and quantities of lace. By the way, lace will be more worn during the summer than ever before. The always fa- vorite Chantilly will be in the fore front. It comes in beautiful new patterns for bedices and for spring wraps, and some ele- gant pieces of jetted Chantilly and net laces are shown already. For the organdies and mulls, some delicate white laces are ex- hibited, which have net tops, with borders of Milanese, Spanish and Pompadour pat- terns interwoven in bewitching designs. ‘The Vandyke laces will be as much in de- mand as ever, but will come in the soft Chantilly patterns. Tho new french lawns are as charming as can possibly be tmagined. They come in very fine quality and at reasonable prices. The fiower tracings take one back to great-grandmother’s day, and it seems as though there cught to come from them the laverder and sandal wood scents that used to cling around her garments. Deli- cate shades of green predominate, and pink, real blush rose pink, comes next. Helictrope in its ng shades will be as much worn as ever, and blue seems pnd have taken a new lease on life, too. course the silk mulls and dot Swisses are out in force. They 1 have colored slips also, to match the ribbons worn with em, or can be worn in all their virgin To wear with these and with sheer white s with bouquets of flowers embroidere hi At y x to be, and some others look had been done in water celc iteiy lovely. If it we ribbons more t gue, these flower-sprinkled designs would ac- h it, but as ribbons are already rything everywhere, one can y thet a new phase of them has Big Sleeves and Crepon. There ts a decided change in sleev @rop—or they droop-just as you like to state it. For ball gowns, they simply slide right off the shoulder, as in the design, which represents a bowkrot sleeve of lisse caught im the center, with a flower or any fancy thing you like to put there. This sleeve may be sid to “drop,” for though but have you} it really will not, you momentarily expect it to, and the suspense as you see round white shoulders shrug themselves free above the flimsy thing is simply awful. Some bodices, as though to reassure the beholder, have straps of velvet or ribbon passing over the shoulder well to the front, but they take away half the fun of the risque drop sleeve. The “drooping s'ceve” has not much in its favor, unless you have a very fine pair of shoulders. Its effect, as will be seen, is to lengthen the shoulder effect by showing the upper arm, and to breaden one across the bust by making the puff widen cut at the elbow. This puff in some of the very latest sleeves is three yards around. This sleeve, on a woman who could wear sackcloth and grace it, will, of course, make a stylish appearance; but on a woman who gets her {deas of what is stylish from the magazines of her modiste, and makes no effort at adapta- tion, this sleeve will look like the mis- chief, till we get used to it. We are to be creponed to death this spring. The epidemic 1s already on us, even before Lent gives us an opportunity to study effectively spring materials. Cre- pon is distinctly stylish, and decidedly preity. A crepon gown gives one a well- dressed appearance. But when one sees erepon on the shop girl, shopper, and the shop counters, almost to the exclusion of all other wool fabrics one gets tired of it, and that is all there is to say about it. Still, crepon is the gown goods of the pres- ent moment, and unless there fs a rapid change in sentiment it will be wern all the spring. It comes in wool, silk and cot- ton. It costs a fortune for the finest, and a@ few cents for the cheapest, and it all has a singularly distinguished air. They come in plain and fancy weaves, in colors and in plain black. The Coming Styles. For spring tailor-made gowns for travel- ing and street gowns canvas and basket cloth effects in light-weight wools will be wern, They will be strong rivals of English serge, but will probably have to end by ai- viding favor with the ‘ges, since nothing more durable for all-around purposes was ever invented. The serges come with a silk stitch shot over them in a contrasting color, which is a very pretty novelty. All the spring materials a in light shades, green and brown with red being the ve orite colo rp henrietta will be and more ceremoni- It will be combined with silk or satin, and the stylish farni- ture will be passementerie. Mohairs and fancy popiins v worn more this sea- son than for some time pa: Many of the newer d. wern for house gown: ous wear outdoors is show a simu- lated ov but the ove rt itself is only a suggestion. The favorite skirt is perfectly plain, flaring at the bottom, smoothly fitted around the hips, and just ing the floor in that jaunty French fashion. It is worn with a bodice of some faney material. Bodices will continue to be the medium of any frenzy in fancy t their wearer may chance to dream about. They are rich, y. Some of them are elegant. h the skirt over these bodices, the on jacket of the same material as the tt hold its own all the spring and summer. For dressy wear the Eton jacket will be fashioned ef lace and passementerie. ‘The flat Dutch bonnet is hideous, tut it is here. It looks like a pan cake on a spree. It squats down on the head behind, just above the knot of hair, and su:denly bulges out at the sides in rosettes or bows or artificial flowers, and sprouts up in front in a surprising and very disconcerting manner. Another phase of it is a gigantic bow with rows of immense half-blown reses along, back of and above the ears. There is nothing else of it worth mention- ing. One of the spring shapes in a walking hat is rather chic. It has a rosette right in front and a row of loops drooping a litle over the brim above with a rosette of vel- vet above each ear. A pretty bodice for the summer stuffs has the crossed front effect, and the longer shoulder hidden under a pretty fancy in shoulder straps. The upper part of the bedice is of alternate rows of insertion, and Is finished with a pearl gorgette. Pearls or their imitation are worn with everything They are the fancy of the hour. The flower gorgettes, made of rows of roses or bunches of violets, fastened to a ribbon band and tied with a jaunty bow of ribbon, are seen on everything. Even street gowns are thus adorned. = THE DINNER TABLE. Simplicity Marks the Bill of Fare and the Decorations. From the New York Times. The fashions of the day all tend toward this refinement. Small means no longer ex- cuse unkempt table fixtures or badly pre- pared food. Shining silver, sparkling giass, brilliant porcelain, a bit of color in flower or embroidery, with immaculate linen, though all be of a very modest cost, now hold a place in the wise mother’s home and are not reserved for company times, but are in evidence every day, Fortunate indeed s it when fashion reached the family ard and ordered her transformation. patra, with her dissolving pearis, eat- from gold platters and drinking from weled goblets, knew little of the real re- finement of the table. In days gone by “skiliful bone picking” was consummate table art, and after the operation was per- Yermed the remnants found the floor, to keep company with the rushes beneath the beard. Simplicity nowadays marks the most formal! Lanquet as weil_as home entertain- ment. A “loaded-down” table has been legated, along with other old-fashioned toms, to the garret of our grandmoth- ers’ traditions. Sideboard serving has done away with the luxury of unpracticed carving, which sometimes spread “wings” as well as “eagles” on tablecloth and laps. ‘The serving is considerably simpler in con- sequence, even when one servant is maid of all work. Haphazard passing and con- fusion around the table among eager youngsters and strange guests anxious to help and be helped ate avoided. A little training soon gets the unruly ones into trim, and gives Bridget, towever stupid, a simple routine of procedure which avoids the displacement of dishes and table deco- rations. The properly served table has lost, at the end of tne meal, none of its original order. oo—__ Women in Politics, From the New York Evening World. At a banquet in Denver, given fn honor of the women candidates for the legisla- ture, a local wag offered this toast: “To the women of Colorado—God bless ‘em! Formerly our superiors; now our equals! WOMEN AT HOME A Mother’s Duties More Important Than Public Work. THE PRINCIPLE OF HOME BUILDING New Fangled Heresies Divorcing Mothers From Their Families. LEFT TO THE SERVANTS Written Exclusively for The Evening Star. HAD A CALL SAT- urday from a woman who is devoted to public work, politics, foreign missions and co-operative house- keeping, with a dash of the higher educa- tion for women, and so forth and so on, to the utter exclu- sion of her own af- fairs. The list of en- gagements which she proudly exhibited was positively appalling, and I have not even a sperking acquaintance with the objects of half of them! “Between the care of my family and entertaining, I had no time at all for out- side work,” she confided to her friends. “And so I induced my husband to give up the house and take a flat, where you have no care concerning coal and water and gas and such mundane things. It ts quite like living, I assure you!” “I believe the boys are quite well,” she replied to my question. “I saw the nurse for a few moments before going to the Geographical Society last evening. She said that Rex had a slight cough, but she had taken him to the doctor, and there was nothing serious the matter with him. Lowell left a note on my dressing table this morning asking if nurse might take them sleigh-riding today, so I presume they are hearty, as boys usually are.” “And the girls?” I aske “I sent them to my sister for the winter. She is so very domestic and has no chil- dren of her own. So she asked me to let the girls go to her, and she will send them to a geod school in Philadelphia, where they can be with her at night. It was quite a care off my mind, I assure you. I so seldom saw them when at home, and they are really getting too large to be kept in the nursery any longer. [ shall hail [| with delight the era when boys and girls are made wards of the n 5 y at in- to government schools, and cared for till they are old enough to take care of them- selve: it will give mothers who have an bove a cook stove and a cradie an opportunity to grow. I can manage quite nicely now, for my husband eats at the club most of the tii and I take my meals wherever I happen to be. We have a co-oper e cooking concern in con- nection with our establishment, where I get some of my meals, but the pn does not like it, so she gets up her own and these of the bo: You see, I am quite free of care concerning the house and my family now, and n devote all my en- rgies to ameliorating the condition of my less favored neighbors.” Why Marriage is a Failure. She said a great deal more, but it {s not neeessary to quote her. Now, I wonder how many mothers who read this are go- ing to let heresics of this kind divorce them from their families. Somebody said not long ago that “the principle of home- building has be pative, and not con trative. als over to church, intellect neglect physical culture ia the main, and then 1 xin to discuss ‘Is Marriage a Failure: Under such ¢ fons it seems to me that the whole institution of life is a failure. As this woman was unfolding her sch; of living 1 couldn't help wondering whether she intended when she married to make her husband live at the club. Or, if he supposed when he made her his wife, and set up a new hearthstone, the time would ever come when his children would be given over to the care of servants and himself shut from the comforts of a home, that his wife might study Buddhism and Barneson contr: s, teach the Digger In- dians to eat greens instead of grasshoppers and cannibals to wear corsets. I have no quarrel to pick with emanci- pated women. If they use the term in the sense that they have freed themselves from womanly attributes they have my profound sympathy. It is to mothers that I am talking; mothers whose social and financial position are such that they might make their homes veritable cor- ners in Eden, if they would, yet who fail to have the slighiest conception of the trust that is vested in them. You seldom hear any nonsense from the middle-class mether about her children. She may re- gret that the new mouth to feed will make the portion of the others smaller, but she loves her little ones, cares for them herself without complaint and protests vigorously against any in- fringement on her mother's right to so care for and educate them after her own fashion. You can’t make her believe that a great big institution, presided over by hired nurses and teachers, is a good place for her little toddler, who is just begin- ning to lisp her name, and runs like a frightened partridge to the shelter of her arms when a stranger appears. A Mother's Place. She wants her growing girl under her own eye, and her boys where she can put her hands on them any time of the day or night. She may be—nay, she probably is—uncultured and unlettered, but she feels in her heart that there is no crea- ture on earth so endowed that it can take the place of one’s own mother. Even the Indian mother, blanketed and uncivilized, has this same feeling for her offspring, and one of the saddest sights I have ever seen was an Indian mother’s sorrow over the loss of her two little ones, who were taken away from her at the tender age of five to put them in a herd of three hundred others at an Indian school, hun- dreds of miles removed from her. And more tragic grief was never expressed than you will find in the dormitories of these same schools, when night comes on ond in the quiet of the long white-walled reoms those little ones sob out their Ione- ly homesickness. As I have said, it is only the woman who has educated motherhood out of her heart and relegated her sacred duties to her servants that I have a grievance against. To such women the word “home” represents a place to cook and eat, wash and sleep and, incidentally, to keep the children till they can be disposed of else- where. ‘The woman who gives up her home du- ties to engage unnecessarily in business or in ch h or social work, or who de- liberately puts awa: ging arms of her children for a is committing a crime against nature, and as surely as the sun shines she will have it to answer for in some wav. The influences in the home have everything to do with shaping the future of children—daughters, as well as the sons. Boys can’t be expected to grow into home-loving, women-reverenc- ing men, whose mothers never kissed “them good-nizht or tucked them in bed when they were babes. They are sure to form their ideas of womankind on those who have to deal with them in youth, and if it were to come to a choice be- tween mother and nurse, ten chances to one if nurse doesn’t win the day. And why not? Nurse feeds him when hungry, soothes him when hurt,consoles him when in trouble. Left to Servants. Knowing nothing of the power of educa- tion herself, she elects to remain ignorant, and, sympathizing with her charge, she helps him to shirk his studies also. Her lower moral plane exactly suits him, be- cause It is less trouble to keep up with it; her unschooled freedom of manner is much more charming in his eyes than the stilted culture of his cold mamma; nurse's friends represent to him all that is worth knowing of life; in fact, her sway over his pliant mind ts absolute, and he enjoys it. It is easier to drift with her than to climb with his teacher. With no stimulus at home, in the shape of parents who are interested in what he is doing at school or on the playground or in his friends; mot sheltered like his mother’s poodle andilacking qualities that make him interesting from a missionary standpoint, the ordinary youth és at last transformed into the average man of the werld, with small sense of moral obliga- tions and a large belief in the inefficacy of social institutions. Is he to blame for his cynicism? Or should the blame fall upon the mother who found street waifs and city slums, official life, foreign mis- sions or a “career” objects of greater in- terest, more worthy her beneficent minis- trations than her’ own sons, who were turned over to servdhts, that her own seif- ish inclinations might be gratified? And how much mare than her sons do her daughters neeq her. Not long since scme writer said that “A girl’s chief cb- ject in life is to glorify womanhood.” But how on earth can she do it, if she has ro one to teach her? Servants can’t instruct your daughters in culture and grace. They can’t teach them to be charitable and for- giving and high minded. They can’t in- euleate in your offspring a character for benevolence. They can’t imbue your girls with a thirst for wider knowledge or lift them to a higher plane of living or help them explore “those paths, pure, womanly, which lead to the comfort, happiness and presperity of the home.” Truth to tell, there are too many Yellow Aster mothers in the world. Too many mothers who are looking for blue roses ard black dahlias. Too many mothers who are pinning their hope of salvation to works. ‘Too many mothers who are trying to make God believe that He made a mistake when He created them women and gave them children to care for. There are also, alas! too many children who are growing up in that same bellef. And it is an awful thing to lose faith in one’s mother. SENORA SARA. —_—_—___ SELF-ADORNED HOMES, Mr. Feathers Finds in Them the Gene- sis of Future Amerienn Art. “Iam inclined to think,” said Mr. Feath- ers, toying with an almond sheil at the side of his plate and looking up with a pleas- ant expression on his benevolent features, “that the artistic education of our peo- ple and their advancement to a plane where they can appreciate the ideais of beauty will be brought about from the genesis of the self-adornment of our homes. I have been led to this opinion by many things that have come under my ob- servation, both remote and contemporary. I was first struck many years ago by the influence of the beautiful upon an ignorant mind. My grandmother was the mistress of art embroidery and her colored girl watched her as she worked with silk and filagree. One day the creature bashfully brought to her for inspection a rough and Srotesque design she had worked herself with cast-off ravelings upon an old piece al- of satin. But that is retrospective, though it shows the stimulation art gi to imitation. Recently you have prob observed the tendei of women to em- broider on linen. Why, there are stores in this city devoted entirely to the sale of linen and silk and stamped Well, design: ave. chai and wher eet and, I must confe: terribly spolit mother the other ed me off on a tour in her own room she proudly displayed a bu cover, a wash- stand cloth, and the s loth back of it, a table cover ahd tiumerous doylies all nicht, Caroline through tho h worked beautifully im dainty forget-me- nots. The mother’s réom was _ equip; with the me articles worked in chr ; blushing fed roses reigned in artment and other fully adhered to in rooms in the house. floral desig: the two other You cannot imagir ctive charm which the dear gifi's handiwork had add- to those modestly furnished apartments 1 that William—that's her zd placed alvery well executed representing @ riotous bunch of en thet spot om the wall where a rette picture had formely looked with brazen! impudence. 1 bless a: as 2 down nm and r Caroline-some gimeracks in delf mighti they would harmonize her blue forget-me-nots. ncluded the old gentleman with ‘h, “the prevailing desire to make our 3 beautiful,no ter how simple they will be the stepping stone by which future gen ions will be elevated to a proper conception of all that is con- tained in that immense word, art.” —— HEELS AND TO Why Women Use the Former and Men the Latter In Muddy Weather. To the Editor of The Evening. In your issue of the 12th instant a philo- sophical “Old Colonel” propounds the ques- tion as to why it happens that a woman, when she comes to a wet or muddy street crossing, always “pulls up her skirts, ele- vates her toes in the air and pecks across on her heels,” while a man, under like con- ditions, invariably travels on his toes. The answer to this question, so far as concer the performance of the man, is very sim- ple. He uses his toes because the back lower edges of his trousers, which he ts not permitted by custom or expediency to raise, a la femme, would certainly be soil- ed if he used bis heels. This theory may not find substantiacion in the habits of that specimen of the genus homo who, regard- less of the weather, rolls his trousers up to high-water mark, in order to be “En- glish. you know,” but I_am speaking only of accountable people. If, aside from the comprehensive and sufficient “because,” a further reason is to be given for any of woman's actions, the following facts may perhaps explain her manner of locomotion under the conditions given: The heels of women’s shoes are higher and the soles much thinner than those on the shoes of men. The use of her heels in crossing wet places, therefore, affords a better guaran- tee against damp or cold feet. Then, too, under ordinary circumstances, a woman's heeis are much less in evidence than her toes, and for this reason are far more ap- propriate for contact with mud. {ft cannot be deried that appearances do amount to something with women. | OPSERVER. Washington, D. C., Feb. 13, 1895; ———— To Wash Silk Underclothing. From the New York Evening World. Wash the silk underclothing in warm (not hot). water and preferably with soap; soak- ing and very hot water will inevitably dis- color and shrink the garments. Moreover, they should be washed alone and never boiled on any account. If they are much soiled, a few drops of ammonia may be added to the water with advantage. The great secret about the washing of silk is to do it as quickly as possible without bing. Rinse in lukewarm water, and at once squeeze the articles gently and let them nearly dry, but do not use pegs in hanging them up; simply spread them over a line or hors: While still damp they should be laid a table, carefully pulled into shape and rolled in a clean cloth. If the clothes have become too dry, this cloth should be evenly damped. Iron carefully all along the thread of the material. Cold rain water is always good to use for deli- cate substances, and for white silk it is especially good mixed with one part of ammonia to twelvé of ‘water. +00 Seeing and Hearing Plants Grow. From the St. Louis Republic. There are several’ ways of rendering the growth of plants both audible and visible, but the modus operandi in the “latest im- proved” experiments is as follows: In or- der to make the gréwt of a very vigorous plant visible, a fine platinum wire should be carefully attached to the growing part. The other end of this wire should be at- tached to a pencil pressing gentiy against a drum which is being driven by clock work. If the growth be uniform a straight line is marked on the paper, but the very slightest increase is shown by inclined tracing. A slight modification of this arrange- ment renders the growth audible. In this experiment the drum must be covered with platinum foils of a certain width, and sep- arated from each other by spaces about one-eighth of an inch. These strips of platinum should be made to complete the circuit of a galvanic bat- tery, to which an electric bell is attached. In this case the bell is kept continually ringing while the plant is growing the height of the width of the strips used, and is silent while the pointer is passing over the spaces between the strips of metal. The growing of corn may be heard direct by means of the microphone, and there are those who declare that they have heard it without any artificial assistance what- ever. HIGH SCHOOL GIRLS Pauline Pry Asks Some Interesting and Pertinent Questions. AIMS AND RESULTS OF EDUCATION In Regard to the Future the Girls Don't Mention Marriage. WELL-TO-DO PEOPLE Written Exclusively for The Evening Star. ‘ HAT SHALL WE do with our girls?” is a conundrum that has recently been en- gaging the attention of the United States Senate. During the progress of the detate on an item of the District appropriation bill to provide $100,000 for the erection of a business high school, Q a distinguished Sen- ater from New England laid it down as a law of common sense that it would be a great deal more to the point of Washing- ton’s educational necessities if, instead of extending High School facilities, an appro- priation were made for public cooking and sewing schools for girls. Said the Senator: “I would make a fair knowledge of all plain sewing, and even perhaps the simpler elements of dressmak- ing, compulsory on the girls; and they ould also léarn how to cook all the or- dinary and necessary dishes in a respect- able family. Then employment could be found for many of them, not alone as good wives, but to work in other families. Sewirg Girls and Cocks. “Ask your wives whether it is easy,in this city of 250,000 inhabitants, with thousands of people complaining that they cannot ake a living, to get a real good seam- stress to come and sew for your family at your house in the good, sensible, old-fash- ioned way. I venture to say that you will ind a serious difficulty in satisfying your- self. If you do not, you will be more for- tunate in that respect than others, and your experience will be different from that with which I am familiar. In this direction a great many women, colored and white, would find employment. “So with cooking. It is not a small job to find—I do not say a French chef; of course that is not difficult if you pay enough—but it is no small job to find a good cook fer an ordinary family; and every girl who goes out of the common schcols ought to be able to step in and take comfortable care of an ordinary me- chanie’s or workingman’s family. It is in the interest of health also that they should be taught what is good food, and how it should be prepared end cooked. That ts my idea of a high school. That would be a useful addition to the common schools.” The Reform in Operation. This seratorial suggestion of a way out of the woman question, servant question and high school question seemed to offer such a simple solution of all these prob- lems that instantly I heard it mentioned I sped to the board of school trustees to know what they were going to do about it. Here, if you will believe me, 1 learned that the senatorial panacea for poor coo! no seamstresses and worthless wives lied in the Washirgton public schools several years ago. The study of cooking ard sewing for girls is made as compulsory as it is possible to make the study of any single branch in the public school system. A girl is excused only fer good and sufli- clent reason assigned by her parents. Sew ing is taught in all the schools in the third, fourth, fifth and sixth grades. In addition to the instruction in cless, there are con- ducted for the whites four and for the colored giris three dressmaking shops, where cutting and fitting are taught as a part of the course in sewing. There are twenty free cooking schools exclusive of those operated in connection with the night schools. At these schools about 8,000 girls are being taught to cook incidental to their seventh and eighth years in the graded schools. Thus is revealed the Senator's reform in ion, and “What shall we do with our is no clearer than it was before the Senate took up the question. It occurred to me then that I'd give the girls themselves a chance at the matter. I'd bear from them what they have done, would do, could do, what their parents have done before them—in short, obtain a comprehensive idea of whether they are or are not receiving a practical education. Education is Not AN. Right here I want to point out a fact commonly overlooked whenever the public school question is under consideration. The training a child gets in school is but one factor in determining its education. There are cthers—heredity, environment, the habits, aims, attainments of parents, character of associates and the free exer- cise outside of school of the individual tendencies of the child. The bearing of all this on the education of a child public schools or other schools may modify, but cannot control. Furthermore, to educate is not to add to nature, but to bring out nature, compre- hended and co-ordinated by the mind. It is not to make mechanics of boys who have it in them to be mechanics; it is not to make cooks of girls who have it in them to be cooks, simply because there is more of a demand for mechanics than for book- keepers, or because a United States Sena- tor fails to get his cooking done to suit him, You may teach a boy to forge; he isn’t perforce a blacksmith. You may teach a girl to sew; she isn’t therefore a seamstress. Oh, I want to get up on a stump and throw rocks and things at Sen- ators and everybody else who argue pro- foundly about practical education without having a glimmer of knowledge of what they're talking about. Let me tell you something to the point of how much great men sometimes know of the questions they discuss and settle. Senatorial Wisdom, During the same debate on the Business High School appropriation, in which girls were set upon, not one, but several grave and reverend seignors, arose, flapped their ears solemnly, and talked fore and aft about the wisdom of teaching commercial geometiy In the public schools. One or two, with that spirit cf humility so beautiful to behold associated with infinite wisdom, confessed they did1't know what commer- cial geometry is, thereby indicating not any limitation of what they know, but the folly of anybody's knowing more. One or two other Senators, while not claiming to be versed in the ‘science of commercial ge- ometry, still, by the application of a pro- found knowledge of the essence of all things, were able to assert for the in- formation of the Senate that the debate might intelligently proceed—“commercial geometry is clearly geomeiry studied for commercial purpose: Eventually, after considerable expense of valuable time and more valuable energy, it was agreed that commercial geometry might properly con- tinue cn the list of studies of the Business High School, and--that I should have to tell it—all the while commercial geometry never was on the list of studies of the Business High School. The list includes— as written down—“commercial geo.,” that is, geography. Yet who would dare sus- pect Senators of jumping at a conclusion or engaging to fight a windmill? I would, and therefore I snap my fingers in the face of their conclusion of what’s best to be done with our girls. The Higher Aim Fad. The fact of the matter is, nobody has any business dictating what’s best for girls who hasn't been a girl, and not the fact that he once wore dresses qualifies any man to exercise this privilege. No; and I wish I could bar a great deal else that has worn dresses from the privilege of teaching girls—every one of those strange creatures clad now in divided skirts, who count brains and the ballot all women’s crowning glory. It would be a great public charity if somebody would hire a hall and let me preach to girls about the vanity of brains. I've had them myself and can preach from experience—had them unti! I know all about the intellectual gluttony that in the name of higher education and higher aims is creating widespread disorder among wo- men. A woman I know—you know her, too, doubtless, and are familiar with the clever literary work she does—a literary woman, who now nevertheless, by the providence of a bitter disappointment, is feebly striv- ing to dig through the mire of exces:ive mentality to find her heart and soul; this woman in a fit of rebellion against the ex- isting order of things lately tried to com- mit suicide. She swallowed a load of lau- danum, and then, like many another who has for variety’s sake played suicide to the gallery gods of his vanity, directly she had swallowed the stuff, she went howling for help. When, after having been walk- ed the night through, she was permitted to go to sleep, she had not the pleasant dreams opium is advertised in China to produce. She says she firmly believes, she had a foretaste of her future punishment. She seemed to exist an independent, form- less, something haying the power of sur- veying her soul, which was set upon by myriad hideous imps that she perceived were her sins. Her soul itself was a hor- rible deformity—head, arms, legs, trunk, all distorted to extend in one single di- rection, and a voice from somewhere told her this deformity was the result of hav- ing during life concentrated her energies upon a single purpose. In a word, this was a vision of a woman's brain developed according to the higher aims of this world taking judgment in the next. The Appetite for Knowledge. But the opium revelation cf this woman is not sufficient to make you understand, if you don’t, that an appetite for knowledge is every bit as carnal as an appetite for flesh. Modern physiologists are able to trace the correspondence between thought and the physical processes of the brain; and modern philosophy, therefore, includes thought in the material world, a function of the body. There is, then, in accord witn this fact demonstrated by science, nothing in knowledge per se which renders it su- perior to the food we put in our stomachs. Ech is acquired to satisfy a natural ap- petite. Each is, under proper conditions, assimilated by the body to nourish the body, and both are inter-operative in the functions they sustain--the process of di- gestion and that of thought, as everybody knows in his own experience, being mutu- ally dependent in results. Indigestion knocks out the philosopher, and philosophy controlling the emotions as frequently aids digestion. There is, then, nothing nobler in feeding your mind than in feeding your stomach, and devouring books to gain knowledge, or because one loves books, is, as your physiclogy demonstrates, no more meritorious than stuffing roast beef to make you fat, or because it tastes good. ‘To read, to study, to think, for the sake of gaining knowledge—to taste your meat, to swallow it and be full. Conan Doyle has cleverly summed up the value of earning in relation to the purpose of life and enunciated what occurs to me as the most comprehensive and simplest solu- tion of the education problem on record. His great creation, Sherlock Holmes, is an epitome of the methods of criminals, and his apparently occult powers of detecting crime are explained by his minute famil- iarity with the history of crime. But his ignorance of much that is commonplace in the understanding of others causes bis friend to marvel, whereupon Sherlock Holmes defines his plan of education thus: “I never learn anything until I need to know it. Thus I waste no energy acq that which Tenders me no service. Thus, also, I am able to keep the storehouse of my mind free from rubbish and Rave space always for the orderly arrangement of every thought I get.” High School Girls, This seems to me indisputably to define a practical education, and by this common- sense standard of the excellence of human attainments I have measured certain data concerning the education of girls gathered from 156 separate sources. That number of girls in attendance upon the High School have written out for me these answers to the following list of questions: 1. What is your father’s education—col- lege, high school, ete.? What is your mother's education? 3. What is your father’s occupation? 4. What is your mother’s occupation? Why are you attending the High School? G. How is your time occupied outside of schoo! hours? 7. What are you reading? 8. What is your aim in life? 9. If you were thrown on your own re- pore today, how could you earn a liv- ng? 10. Define briefly your idea of a good cit- izen. The manifestly mischievous absurdity of educating children to become intellectual aliens in their homes suggested framing the questions concerning parents for the purpose of determining what, if any, lack of harmony in this particular exists as a result of the inducements of free high schools. The answers disclose that . uni- formiy the girls pursuing a high school course have parents who have enjoyed similar privileges. Thus is indicated not only no confusion resulting between parents and children in consequence of the advanced studies of the high school, but incidentally notice there is shown in this also that the theory of sustaining high schools at public expense—to provide all with an opportunity for advanced study— is in effect to sustain a school for the ben- efit of none but educated, well-conditioned parents. The financial condition of the families represented in the high school is pressed in the answers to the question: What is your mother’s occupation?” Out of 156 queried but ten indicated cireum- stances requiring the mother to have an occupation yielding money returns. Why They Go to School. More than 50 per cent of the girls go to the high school aimlessly, animated only by that false regard for the value of in- tellectual attainments apart from some clearly defined end in view that makes what is roughly denominated by earnest persons “educated fools.” “I attend the high school because it is not too expensive, and because the edu- cation is a good, sensible one. “I attend the high school to complete my education more.” “I come to the high school because I want to learn something and because I epjoy coming.” “lam attending the high school for the purpose of attaining a broader and higher knowledge of things in general.” “I attead the high school for the sake of the education which I gain thereby.” Six girls out of the whole 156 were able to declare the distinct purpose of at- tending the high school in order to enter. the normal schcol. One girl stated her purpose was to fit herself for a medical school. Ten are prepering for college, and thirty-seven have the general intention of becoming teaphers. A large majority of the girls in desig- nating their occupations outside of school hours revealed sweet, simple lives, har- moriously adjusied to their homes and th youth. Two-thirds do a certain amount of housework—tending their own rooms, doing the marketing, dusting the paricrs, &c. The remaining one-third di- vide their time between study, reading, visiting and music. One summed up her occupation outside of school hours, having as good a time as possible er said she spent her time studying and slecping, while another to the same cate- gory added eating. Books They Read. What the girls read 1s so untformiy standard in character as to suggest the po- tency of careful school teachers in this matter, though several of the girls an- ncunced themselves as reading “'Trilby, which.possibly indicates the confusion like- ly to arise when a brash book gets scored to the credit of a good artist. Or it may be there is an edition of “Trilby” expurgated for the consumption of school girls. Is there? In securing a definition of a good citizen from the girls, the object was to ascertain how near their minds come to a realization of the ideal, to preserve which, in theory, our free schools were created. It seems to me the girls are a credit to their country on this count. Certainly the girl who defined a good citizen as a “sober, honest American” can have no fault found with her loyal estimate of the nationality necessary to good citizenship. “A true Christian will make a good citi- zen.” “I think a good citizen Is one who obeys the laws of his country and tries to help others obey them.” “A person who obeys the laws of his country and uses whatever power he may pessess in bettering its condition.” “A good citizen is peaceful, honest and just. Such and similar are the views of our iris concerning their duty to their coun- ry. But, oh! if ye have tears prepare to shed them now on learning the aims of our girls. To record these aims in full would require too much space. Of the 156 girls queried 125 are aiming at a professional Some Aims in Life. Seventeen additional, while not yet fixed upon a profession, are still so strong-mind- ed = the following indefinite ambitions in- ate: “My aim is to promote the rights of women.” “My aim fs to earn my own living. “My aim is to be a good, self-reliant woman; a help, not a burden to those with whom I come in contact, a1 if possible, to study medicine.” ree “My aim in life is to eventually raise and help the mass of ignorant people who waste what little they have for want of knowledge, and are miserable and oppress- ed; to do this by writing of them just as they are, or by personal influence, teach- ing and living and working amorg them.” STo be a good, independent woman.” ‘My aim is to be an independent wo- td after the would-be professional Then, and independent women, are sixteen girls whose aim is sentimental in this way: ‘My aim in life is to help my father and mother and take care of them when they Bet old. as good as they have me.” aim is to grow u| rthy of the name.” = peer ane “My alm in life is to be a comfort to eens by always making others hap- “To be a good woman. ‘To be a womanly woman.” Just four girls of the entire 156 aim to be a good housekeeper. One couples this ambition with that of being also a society belle. Another has an all around domestic ambition that must delight her grand- mother or a New England Senator. ‘My aim in life is to keep house, make my own dresses, cook a good meal and take care of my mother.” In the matter of perceiving what they could do if thrown on their own resources at the present time the girls bravely recon- cile their higher aims with stern necessi- = and show the spirit of a true Ameri- One who writes down her aim to be a lady says: “if thrown on my own re- sources I would do anything except bez.” Another, who has the purely altruistic ambition of being a comfort to her friends, if thrown on her own resources would do “plain sewing, darning or anything about a house.” Another says she would “do anything but give up in despair and die of cold or starvation.” Another, who aims to elevate humanity, professes both ability and willingness to be a governess or “scrub and scour beau- ufully.”” Another says she can’t think what she would do for a living, but she would cer- tainly “fly around” and do something. Another says “It would be impossible for me, as it’s an ill wind that blows no good.” Several girls say they had never before thought that they might have to earn a living, and so are unable to suggest what they might do. Marringe Not in View. But this is the startling, painful dis- covery I make among all these girls’ re- vealed ambiticns. Not one among the whole eight score is aiming to get married. In all their varied schemes of life they have not a thought of men or matrimony, and, by the same token, I declare their education is not practical. Whether pub- lic schools, parents. or the unholy zeal of the female suffrage agitators abroad over the land is to blame I don’t know. But so much is clear: Girls cannet be so uni- versally false to nature that out of 156 of them nore should include a husband and a home of their own in reckoning on their future, and that not one was frank enough to publicly refer to these things certainly reveals false notions of dignity and wo- man’s highest aim. Still, I dare: this assertion is dog- matic, and it may not be true. I may not know what I am talking about. Perhaps girl nature has changed since George the Third was king and I was young. Perhaps girls nowadays would really rather be in- tellectual than be marricd and love science and art better than boys. In that case there’s nothing to be done with our girls. They are ail right. But what shall we do with our boys? Will the United States Senate please set- tle this question, and oblige, Yours for progress, PAULINE PRY. ——— LUNCHES FOR SCHOOL CHILDREN, The Experiment of Serving Hygienic Food at Mederate Prices. From the New York Tim The expcrinent tricd at the Massachu- setts Instituie of Technology of serving hygienic luncheens to the students has proved an entire success. It has a patron- age of hetween 300 and 409 a day, and has not only paid its running expenses, but in three years has paid all the cost of its establishment. It is interesting to note that the appetites of its patrons have grown with what they have fed upon, the average prices having steadily increased from 19 cents the first year to 21 the sec- ord and 22 last year. Two typical menus for a 15-cent luncheon are: 1, pea soup, two bread sticks, crackers and butter; 2, corned becf hash, biscuit, apple sauce. A biil of fare for one day in December shows: Tomato soup with bread 15 cts. to soup, one cup, wi 8 cts. n stew with bread. - 15 cts. Fish balls, three for. cis. Corn bread......... cts. Chicken and macaroni. --- 15 cts, 3aked Indian pudding with cream.. 10 cts. The institute lunch room purchases daily in betk a number of dishes prepared by the New England kitchen, thus securing the most wholesome cooking. The question of school luncheons Is a wide-reaching one. Seeds of future ill health are, more often than mothers imag- ine, sown in the hasty consumption in the roon recess of the pastry cook's products. At no time is good and nourishing food more important or its absence more harm- ful than to the growing child, hungry and craving, and hard at work in the modern torcing educating process. Seay ee Over the Sea to Skye. From the Pall Mall Budget a song of a w gone, Se could that Ind be Tt Merry of soul he sailed om a day ‘Over the sea to Skye. Mull was astern, Ecz on the port, Rum on the starboard bow; Glory of youth glowed in bis soul. Where is that glory now? Sing me a sonq of a 1nd that is gone, Ss nd lad be I? Me be sailed on a day ‘Over the sea to Skye. Give me again all that was there, Give me the san that shone! Give me the eyes, cive me the soul, Give me the lad that's gone! Sing me a song of a lad that is gone, Say, cold that Ind be 1? Merry of soul he safied on a day Over the fea to Biliow and breeze. islands and seas, ‘Mountains of rain and sen, All that was good, all that was fat, ‘All that was me fs cone. ROBELT LOUIS STEVENSON. Income Tax Suggestion, From the New York Tribune. “I have an idea,” said the scoffer. “Some people—a good many people, in fact—have a weakness foc magnifying their incomes. I don’t mean, of course, the fellow who has an income of $5,000 a year and lives at the rate of $20,000 a year, so long as his cred- itors will stand it. But there is the chap who likes to make you think he’s a devil of a feliow for making money. I don’t know why it fs, but there are lots of such people. They secm to fancy that you will think a great deal more of them if you be- Neve that they are money-makers. Well, here is a fine chance for them. What is to prevent men whos? incomes range from $2,000 to $3,500, ox, for that matter, from $200 up, from ackNowledging to the inter- nal revenue collector an income of $4,1007 ‘They will have to pay a tax of 2 per cent on $100, of course, but that will amount to only $2, and think of the fun they will have complaining about the trouble and fuss of making out the blarks and the injustice of having to pay 2 tax just because a man has brains enough to make money. Fun! It will be worth §2 to them a dozen times over.” FOR HEADACHE AND INDIGESTION Use Horsford’s Acid Phosphate. A prominent physician of Buffalo, N. ¥., says of it: “I have severe headaches, and it relieves them. I am fond of the of the and as ® consequence of my indulgen: ce there, have to the penalty, Tt disides penalty wit me. it is an le