Page:New Peterson magazine 1859 Vol. XXXVI.pdf/19



ANCIENT

GREEK

COSTUME.

generation interpolated into the eighteenth

Christian century. The more decent and reverent times that have followed would repudiate the free manners and even more free attire of the fair, frail companions of

Barras and other atheistical high-priests of plunder and the guillotine. There is not a drawing~room in civilized society which would now countenance a dress

such as Madame Recamier wore in the hey-day of her beauty, nor a woman, how ever daring, who would venture to appear at. an evening party, with her drapery looped up on one side to her knee, :1 la Diana, like Madame Tallien. Is it not possible, however, to invent a costume,

which should be as graceful as the Greek, yet be open to none of its objections? Magniﬁcent as the cotemporay' fashion is, it is, on all hands, reason is, that, if Raphael bodies are pronounced conceded to be stiﬂ'. fashionable, every American lady wishes a Re. No modern belle, so ‘phael body, while in Paris, no woman wears long as she Wears g such a dress unless it is becoming to her. In hoops and moire nn- l the United States, when a woman selects a bon tique, can look as IN-r/JAVIN/I JIN”V,I' net, she buys it because graceful as her Greit is beautiful in itself,

cian sister of the

and forgets oﬂen to as

times of Alcibiades

certain if it suits her style and face. The old Greeks, if we may judge from the few illustrations we have presented, had even more

The error of American ladies is in nlavishly

following what. are called the fashions.

French

women consult their height, complexion,

and style; and mo dify the prevailing fashion accordingly. The result is that

of taste and individuality than the modern French. The inﬁnite variety of

their head-dresses, of which we give here only a

few, especially establishes this. If ladies would xercise their own good taste, and rely less on tirely on mantua-makcrs, there would soon be a sed. There is an in reform in female dress. From the great variety dividuality about the §’», of patterns, which we pub women of the French l lish every month, every woman can certainly sc capital, strikingly in leet one, it" not more, contrast with the monotonous uniformity seen in adapted to her complex England and America. In these United States, ion and person. The true indeed, we have more miss-"ion, if we may say so, taste than the Eng— MW,”Mw,»/ (,¢/ of a ladies Magazine, is to lish; but we are sad reform taste in dress. We ly behind the French shall endeavor to do our nevertheless. A Pa every Parisian belle is becomingly dres

risian woman dresses

part, by furnishing, not

on only half the money that it costs onc of equal income in New York or Philadolphin, yet looks in-

only the most elegant styles of each season, but y also occasional articles on‘ the beautiful and pic i turt-sque in dress in all ages and climates. l The Roman ladies dressed, on the whole, very glike the Greeks: with more start-liners, perinps,

ﬁnitely better.

The i but somewhat less grace.

Many of the statues