WOMEN^S CLOTHES 21 



of the wind. But if you explained to a man, who is 

 your friend, the reason of the wind being an infernal 

 nuisance to him, he would take it as an insult and 

 perhaps never speak to you again. It would be a 

 reflection on his manliness. 



Woman's dislike of the wind, we know, is caused 

 by her dress, or, let us say, because she has not yet 

 found out the way to clothe herself suitably for out- 

 door work and exercise. Barbarians and savages 

 know the way, but as our civilisation progressed and 

 our women were more and more confined to the house, 

 they clothed themselves for that condition mainly, 

 and after several thousand years of study and experi- 

 ment have succeeded in making their covering as 

 beautiful as we want it to be. That is for so long as 

 we think clothing necessary at all: the main fault 

 with the clothing is that there is too much of it ; but 

 it is a fault which there is now happily a tendency 

 to remedy. Undoubtedly there are Eastern costumes 

 more beautiful; but to our Western eyes the beauty 

 is of a kind which we do not desire to see adopted, 

 since it is not in harmony with our Western feeling 

 about womankind, and appears to us designed to 

 give artificial or fictitious charm and allurement to 

 the inane sex. 



This indoor dress which pleases becomes unsuitable 

 and even absurd when worn out of doors in wind 

 and rough and wet weather, a usual condition in this 

 " brumous island." The headgear, designed to har- 

 monise with the costume, makes it worse; what 

 wonder then that if a hundred women be asked their 



