ECOlSrOMIC EOLE OF FASHION— CLERGET. 765 



of ribbon, has produced no appreciable result. Those only have in- 

 fluence upon fashion who make it and promote it, those who offer it 

 and those who can refuse it — ^the tailor and the customer. The first 

 is too much concerned in the changes of fashion to expect him to 

 make any effort to restrain them ; the second is quiet, provided that 

 he be included. If fashion responds to an innate tendency of our 

 nature, the fondness for change, the actual rapidity of this change 

 is neither disastrous nor necessary, as the long use of the tailor-made 

 costume shows. The last word shall be given to the social leagues 

 of buyers and the leagues of consumers, because of the very interest- 

 ing initiative taken by the former in favor of handmade lace with a 

 view to reviving that valuable rural industry. After having brought 

 about the assembling at Paris of an exposition of women's work, they 

 asked their members simply to require mention of the origin " hand- 

 made " or " machine-made " on the laces put on sale. 



