330 



♦ KNOXA^LEDGE ♦ 



[JoNE 1, 1883. 



(editorial (Boi^ip. 



A RECENT writer asserts that, according to statistics, 

 dark-haired women have better chances of marrying than 

 their fair-liaired sisters. The statistics are not very satis- 

 factory. Tliey show, he tells us, that there are three fair- 

 haired spinsters for two dark-haired ones. To give a 

 meaning to this we should be told at what shade the line is 

 drawn which separates dark from fair ; or are onlj' the 

 nearly black-haired considered in one category and the 

 nearly flaxen-haired in the other ? Then we need to be told 

 in what proportion, numerically, are the fair and dark 

 women thus classified ; for, if there are more fair than dark 

 in a ratio exceeding 3 to "2, the statistics point the other 

 way from that indicated by our author, whereas if the dark 

 are more numerous than the fair, in any ratio, the inference 

 he draws from statistics is strengthened. Yet, even if a 

 relation of this kind should be proved, complexion may 

 have little or nothing to do with the matter. The statistics 

 may, perhaps, show that particular complexions are 

 commonly found in company with such and such tempera- 

 ments and dispositions ; /hfs>>, and not the complexions, 

 may be the attraction chiefly influencing conjugal 

 selection. 



In point of fact, statistics are very seldom dealt with 

 correctly, even by those whose special business it is to 

 analyse and interpret them. Dr. Stark finds that the 

 death rate among the unmarried is higher than among the 

 married ; another finds that crime is more common among 

 the unmarried ; madness, also, seems, according to statistics, 

 to visit the single more than the married. So Dr. Stark, 

 and a host of others as hasty in their use of statistics, go 

 about proclaiming that marriage prolongs life, checks 

 crime, and stays the evil course of madness in the blood. 

 It never seems to occur to them that marriage is a selective 

 process, and that, on the avcragi', the unhealthy, the 

 criminal, the mentally inferior, have less chance of marry- 

 ing than their more fortunate brothers and sisters. 



It would matter little if these were mere questions of 

 opinion. But, unfortunately, such statements exert a 

 real and mischievous influence on conduct. Where 

 marriage is arranged or encouraged by parents or guardians, 

 as likely to check the progress of disease — bodily, mental, 

 or moral — the good eflfccts expected may or may not follow, 

 but the reversion of bodily, mental, or moral disease among 

 the offspring is ensured. 



No such harm is perhaps likely to follow from the pro- 

 mulgation of the theory that for a woman to be fair- 

 headed is to have no fair chance of conjugal selection. 

 The theory might cause the fair-headed to dye, perhaps ; 

 but that would be balanced by its influence in preventing 

 the dark-haired from seeking such golden dyes as were in 

 favour not so long ago. Still, it is well to have statistics 

 properly dealt with. 



Some of the statistical "facts" brought before the 

 public have as much real truth in them as there was in the 

 well-known saying that statistics prove the railway car- 

 riage to be safer than the house. This is really demon- 

 strated by statistics quite as clearly as the theory that " to 

 be unmarried (we quote Dr. Stark) is as fatal as to live 

 in ill-drained houses," or in places where the death-rate 

 is very high. Only, whereas even those who ought to 



know better are deceived by one statistical fact, no one is 

 quite so foolish as not to see that if more per cent, die at 

 home than in railway carriages (even during excursion 

 times) it is not because of any preservative action in the 

 railway carriage, but because those who are likely soon to 

 die usually stay at home. 



The Tuifs has devoted a leading article to the Rational 

 Dress Exhibition, and has taken a very fair and common- 

 sense view of the suggested changes in feminine dress. 

 But because the Rational Dress Reformers carefully refrain 

 from playing their best card, the game is going against 

 them. The most ardent advocates of reform in dress (male 

 or female dress) are likely to be deterred by proposals for 

 changes which attract attention. Women, especially, are 

 not likely to adopt, even for the sake of comfort or health, 

 a dress which would cause them to be stared at. And they 

 are quite right. For, apart from the sense of propriety 

 which leads every right-minded woman to avoid making 

 herself conspicuous, there is the consideration that there 

 is a larger proportion of ofiensively-staring folk in all 

 classes in this country than in any civilised or semi- 

 civilised community on the face of this earth. Those who 

 would reform dress, then, should devise changes which, 

 though eflective, are inconspicuous. They should take a 

 lesson (/as est ah Iwste doceri) from fashion, which does not 

 hurry women to the successive absurdities in which it 

 rejoices, but guides them gradually from the mania of ex- 

 panded crinolines to the imbecility of tie-backs, and causes 

 the insanely straight outlines of one era to pass by slow 

 gradations into the wildly serpentine undulations of 

 another. If, for example, the reformers were to watch 

 the progress of the change which is changing fashionably- 

 dressed women to the appearance (especially when walking 

 or turning) of fan-tailed pigeons, and were to strive by 

 slight but progressive changes, each scarcely noticeable, 

 to introdue healthier, lighter, and warmer habiliments, 

 they might do good to thousands for each one whom they 

 can now induce to face the goggle-eyed in obviously divided 

 skirts. 



Numbers of letters reach me because of a letter I wrote 

 to the Times, showing how much good might be done 

 without any discernible change at all, and numbers of 

 comments, chiefly sensible — but some foolish — have ap- 

 peared in the papers. Among the less sensible comments 

 are those dwelling on the courage required to change the 

 costume to the extent mentioned in my letter ; for I was 

 careful to explain that I referred to a compromise already 

 described in the Times leader — a change of dress absolutely 

 unnoticeable even by feminine eyes. 



The Standard, illogically enough, remarks that ladies 

 were able to walk, play tennis, sing, dance, and so forth, 

 before divided skirts were thought of. What has this to 

 do with the fact that many ladies, having tried the experi- 

 ment, find they can do all these things better, and with 

 more pleasure to themselves, after a quite undiscernible 

 change of attire, than they could before! The Dnhlin 

 Mail makes some reference to the propriety of the subject 

 for discussion, on which I would only remark that any one 

 who finds impropriety in the subject must belong to the 

 class which Charles Reade has dealt with in a well-known 

 letter on "The Prurient Prude." 



In" several of these communications the ladies mentioned 

 in my letter to the Times are identified as my daughters, 



