Page:Once a Week Volume 8.djvu/44

36 They slew with sword Sir Engelbret, And nine of my fair sons as well.

My husband and my sons with brand They slew. How I bewail their case! My tenth son bore they from the land— I never more shall see his face.

Now is my care as complicate As golden threads which maidens spin; God crown with bliss Sir Engelbret, He ever was so free from sin.

But now I’ll take the holy vows, Within the cloyster under Ey; I’ll ne’er become another’s spouse, But in religion I will die.

But first to all the country side I will declare my bosom’s grief; I find, the more my grief I hide, The less, the less, is my relief.

no apology for reproducing some facts from the newspapers, for once; nor for earnestly—I wish I might be allowed to say, peremptorily—desiring the attention of the readers of to these facts in their collected form. I do so for a purpose eminently practical.

It is a common thing to hear women say that they are tired of the abuse of crinoline: and it is almost as common to hear men say that there is no use in declaring their opinion of the present fashion in dress, as the women have shown very plainly that no considerations of self-respect, no regard for the convenience or feelings of others, no appeal to either sense or sentiment has any effect in regard to a fashion in dress which, instituted by an Empress, has enslaved her whole sex, except the very few who cannot surrender their self-respect even under a prevalent mania. All this is very true: but I think there may be some hope that a glance over the domestic tragedies disclosed by some of the Coroners’ inquests of the past year may possibly hasten the change of fashion which, of course, must come sooner or later. It is too late now for my countrywomen of the present generation to regain the position they held in the respect and confidence of men before this perilous and selfish madness carried them away. It is too late for society and for households to forget the sacrifices imposed on all their members by the unreasonable and ungenerous indulgence of a fancy in dress on the part of women whose proper business it is to promote the comfort and safety of home and of society. It is too late to repair the mischief done to the women of the working classes by tempting them to extravagance and affectation in the pursuit of a masquerading mode of dress. It is too late now to help the bereaved parents who have lost the dutiful daughter, to console the sorrowing widower, or to save the many motherless children in the country from the consequences of the loss of a parent in infancy. The victims of this perilous fashion cannot be brought to life again; nor is there any rational comfort which can be offered to those who mourn them: for of all deaths none surely are so shocking to the feelings of survivors as those which proceed from a dangerous fashion in dress. If the Coroner’s jury, in the case of Dr. Allen’s cook, “could not separate without expressing their disgust and horror” at the cause of her death, what must be the feelings of husbands, fathers, and orphaned children at having their home made desolate by such a frailty as compliance with an absurd fashion in skirts. The folly and crime of the past are irreparable; but I cannot help hoping that the evidence, if presented in groups of cases, may fix the imagination and the conscience of some women who are superior to the ordinary levity and shallowness, and childish wilfulness which are in this case as bad as malice and cruelty could be. Some few women of my acquaintance have throughout had the courage and firmness to resist the prevalent mania; and knowing this, and witnessing the effect of their virtue on the feelings of their neighbours of both sexes, I see every reason to hope that there may be more who can be startled into reason and conscience by a display of a few facts in their right order.

Before me lie the details of some of the deaths by crinoline, which have been inquired into by Coroners’ juries within a few months. They are not nearly all the cases that might have been collected by any one on the look-out for them. They are a mere handful, preserved on account of something remarkable in them, or from their following each other, at certain periods, in striking succession. On a recent occasion, Dr. Lankester declared his belief that at least six deaths per month occur in London from burns through the wearing of crinoline, while deaths from machinery are also frequent. At another inquest he said that “deaths from wearing crinoline were now so common that many are never reported in the public journals. If every fatal crinoline accident were reported, the public would know of them, and then crinoline would soon be abandoned.” My instances must therefore be considered a mere sample of the evils caused by this detestable fashion within the last few months.

The most interesting class to us all is probably that of the wives and mothers.

The wife of an engineer, Mrs. M. A. B, was on a visit to a friend on Notting Hill when she met her death at the age of twenty-eight. She reached for something over the mantel-piece, and her skirt went into the fire. She was carried to St. Mary’s hospital, and immediately died there.—This was the way in which the guest of Mr. and Mrs. Charles Mathews perished lately. The suffferersufferer [sic] and her daughter were from America; and probably there was the exaggeration in the style of dress which is usual in that country. She was standing before the fire when her skirt touched the bars. She ran out upon the stairs, after setting on fire the drapery round the fire-place she had left. Her screams will never be forgotten by her child, or any who heard them. Before night she was silent for ever.

More deaths are caused by the skirt catching fire behind than in front. It was but the other day that a poor young collier’s wife, M. A. R, was stooping to her baby’s cradle, when her large hoop drove her dress behind against the bars. Then followed the useless endeavours of neighbours, with their blankets and wet towels; useless in these days, because the hoops prevent any effectual compression of the dress, and admit air