PLATE XXIIIMrs. Vernon Castle who set to-day's fashion in outline of costume and short hair for the young woman of America. For this reason and because Mrs. Castle has form to a superlative degree (correct carriage of the body) and the clothes sense (knowledge of what she can wear and how to wear it) we have selected her to illustrate several types of costumes, characteristic of 1916 and 1917.Another reason for asking Mrs. Castle to illustrate our text is, that what Mrs. Castle's professional dancing has done to develop and perfect her natural instinct for line, the normal exercise of going about one's tasks and diversions can do for any young woman, provided she keep in mind correct carriage of body when in action or repose. Here we see Mrs. Castle in ball costume.Mrs. Vernon Castle in Ball CostumeMrs. Vernon Castle in Ball Costume
Mrs. Vernon Castle who set to-day's fashion in outline of costume and short hair for the young woman of America. For this reason and because Mrs. Castle has form to a superlative degree (correct carriage of the body) and the clothes sense (knowledge of what she can wear and how to wear it) we have selected her to illustrate several types of costumes, characteristic of 1916 and 1917.
Another reason for asking Mrs. Castle to illustrate our text is, that what Mrs. Castle's professional dancing has done to develop and perfect her natural instinct for line, the normal exercise of going about one's tasks and diversions can do for any young woman, provided she keep in mind correct carriage of body when in action or repose. Here we see Mrs. Castle in ball costume.
Mrs. Vernon Castle in Ball CostumeMrs. Vernon Castle in Ball Costume
That is woman as the Mother of God in art Woman as the mother of man, who looked on these inspired works of art, lived for the most part in small houses built of wood with thatched roofs, unpaved streets, dirty interiors, which were cleaned but once a week—on Saturdays! The men of the aristocracy hunted and engaged in commerce, and the general rank and file gave themselves over to the gaining of money to increase their power. It sounds not unlike New York to-day.
Gradually the cities grew large and rich. People changed from simple sober living to elaborate and less temperate ways, and the great families, with their proportionately increased wealth gained through trade, built beautiful palaces and built them well. The gorgeous colouring of the frescoed walls shows Byzantine influence. InThe Art of Interior Decorationwe have described at length the house furnishingof that time. Against this background moved woman, man's mate; note her colour scheme and then her rôle. (We quote from Jahn Rusconi inLes Arts, Paris, August, 1911.)
"Donna Francesca dei Albizzi's cloak of black cloth ornamented on a yellow background with birds, parrots, butterflies, pink and red roses, and a few other red and green figures; dragons, letters and trees in yellow and black, and again other figures made of white cloth with red and black stripes."
Extravagance ran high not only in dress, but in everything, laws were made to regulate the amount spent on all forms of entertainment, even on funerals, and the cook who was to prepare a wedding feast had to submit his menu for approval to the city authorities. More than this, only two hundred guests could be asked to a wedding, and the number of presents which the bride was allowed to receive was limited by law. But wealth and fashion ran away with laws; the same old story.
As the tide of the Renaissance rose and swept over Europe (the awakening began in Italy), the woman of the gorgeous cloak andher contemporaries, according to the vivid description of the last quoted author, were "subject to their husbands' tyranny, not even knowing how to read in many cases, occupied with their household duties, in which they were assisted by rough and uncouth slaves, with no other mission in life than to give birth to a numerous posterity… This life ruined them, and their beauty quickly faded away; no wonder, then, that they summoned art to the aid of nature. The custom was so common and the art so perfect that even a painter like Taddeo Gaddi acknowledged that the Florentine women were the best painters in the world!… Considering the mental status of the women, it is easy to imagine to what excesses they were given in the matter of dress." The above assertions relate to the average woman, not the great exceptions.
The marriage coffers of woman of the Renaissance in themselves give an idea of her luxurious tastes. They were about six feet long, three feet high, and two and a half feet deep. Some had domed covers opening on hinges—the whole was carved, gilded andpainted, the background of reds and blues throwing the gold into relief. Scenes taken from mythology were done in what was known as "pastille," composition work raised and painted on a gold background. On one fifteenth century marriage coffer, Bacchus and Ariadne were shown in their triumphal car drawn by winged griffins, a young Bacchante driving them on. Another coffer decorated in the same manner had as decoration "The Rape of Proserpine."
Women rocked their infants in sumptuous carved and emblazoned walnut cradles, and crimson satin damask covered their beds and cushions. This blaze of gold and silver, crimson and blue we find as the wake of Byzantine trade, via Constantinople, Venice, Rome, Florence on to France, Spain, Germany, Holland, Flanders and England. Carved wood, crimson, green and blue velvets, satin damask, tapestries, gold and silver fringe and lace. Against all this moved woman, costumed sumptuously.
Gradually the line of woman's (and man's) neck is lost in a ruff, her sweeping locks, instead of parted on her brow, entwined withpearls or other gems to frame her face and make long lines down the length of her robe, are huddled under grotesque head-dresses, monstrous creations, rising and spreading until they become caricatures, defying art.
In some sixteenth century Italian portraits we see the ruff flaring from a neck cut out square and low in front, then rising behind to form a head covering.
The last half of the sixteenth century is marked by gowns cut high in the neck with a close collar, and the appearance of a small ruff encircling the throat. This ruff almost at once increased to absurd dimensions.
The tightly laced long-pointed bodice now appears, with and without padded hips. (The superlative degree of this type is to be seen in portraits by Velasquez (seePlate IX).)
Long pointed toes to the shoes give way to broad, square ones.
Another sixteenth century departure is the absurdly small hat, placed as if by the wind, at a careless angle on the hair, which is curled and piled high.
Also we see hats of normal size with many plumes, on both men and women.
Notice the sleeves: some are still flowing, with tight undersleeves, others slashed to show full white sleeve beneath. But most important of all is that the general license, moral and artistic, lays its ruthless hand on woman's beautiful, sweeping shoulder line and distorts it. Anne of Cleves, or the progressive artist who painted her, shows in a portrait the Queen's flowing sleeves with mediæval lines, clasped by a broad band between elbow and shoulder, and thenpushed upuntil the sleeve forms an ugly puff. A monstrous fashion, this, and one soon to appear in a thousand mad forms. Its first vicious departure is that small puffy, senselessly insinuated line between arm-hole and top of sleeve in garments for men as well as women.
Skirts button from point of basque to feet just before we see them, in the seventeenth century, parting down the front and separating to show a petticoat. In Queen Elizabeth's time the acme of this style was reached by Spanish women as we see in Velasquez's portraits. Gradually the overskirt is looped back, (at first only a few inches), and tied with narrow ribbons.
PLATE XXIVMrs. Vernon Castle in Winter afternoon costume, one which is so suited to her type and at the same time conservative as to outline and detail, that it would have charm whether in style or not.Mrs. Vernon Castle in Afternoon Costume--WinterVictor Georg—ChicagoMrs. Vernon Castle in Afternoon Costume—Winter
Mrs. Vernon Castle in Winter afternoon costume, one which is so suited to her type and at the same time conservative as to outline and detail, that it would have charm whether in style or not.
Mrs. Vernon Castle in Afternoon Costume--WinterVictor Georg—ChicagoMrs. Vernon Castle in Afternoon Costume—Winter
The second quarter of the seventeenth century shows the waist line drawn in and bodice with skirts a few inches in depth. These skirts are the hall-mark of a basque.
Very short, full coats flaring from under arms now appear.
After the skirt has been pushed back and held with ribbons, we find gradually all fulness of upper skirt pushed to hips to form paniers, and across the back to form a bustle effect, until we have the Marie Antoinette type, late eighteenth century. Far more graceful andséduisantthan the costume of Queen Elizabeth's time.
The figures presented by Marie Antoinette and her court, powdered wigs and patches, paniers and enormous hats, surmounting the horsehair erections, heavy with powder and grease, lace, ribbon flowers and jewels, are quaint, delightful and diverting, but not to be compared with the Greek or mediæval lines in woman's costume.
Extremely extended skirts gave way to aninterlude of full skirts, but flowing lines in the eighteenth century English portraits.
The Directoire reaction towards simplicity was influenced by English fashion.
Empire formality under classic influence came next. Then Victorian hoops which were succeeded by the Victorian bustles, pantalets, black velvet at throat and wrists, and lockets.
THEeighteenth century is unique by reason of scientific discoveries, mechanical inventions and chemical achievements, coupled with the gigantic political upheaval of the French Revolution.
It is unique, distinguished and enormously fruitful. For example, the modern frenzy for chintz, which has made our homes burst into bloom in endless variety, had its origin in the eighteenth century looms at Jouy, near Versailles, under the direction of Oberkampf.
Before 1760 silks and velvets decorated man and his home. Royal patronage co-operating with the influence of such great decorators as Percier and Fontaine gave the creating of beautiful stuffs to the silk factories of Lyons.
Printed linens and painted wall papers appeared in France simultaneously, and for the same reason. The Revolution set mass-taste(which is often stronger than individual inclination), toward unostentatious, inexpensive materials for house furnishing and wearing apparel.
The Revolution had driven out royalty and the high aristocracy who, with changed names lived in seclusion. Society, therefore, to meet the mass-desire, was driven to simple ways of living. Men gave up their silks and velvets and frills, lace and jewels for cloth, linen, and sombre neck-cloths. The women did the same; they wore muslin gowns and their own hair, and went to great length in the affectation of simplicity and patriotic fervour.
We hear that, apropos of America having at this moment entered the great struggle with the Central Powers, simplicity is decreed as smart for the coming season, and that those who costume themselves extravagantly, furnish their homes ostentatiously or allow their tables to be lavish, will be frowned upon as bad form and unpatriotic.
These reactions are inevitable, and come about with the regularity oftidesin this world of perpetual repetition.
The belles of the Directorate shook their heads and bobbed their pretty locks at the artificiality Marie Antoinette et cie had practised. I fear they called it sinful art to deftly place a patch upon the face, or make a head-dress in the image of a man-of-war.
Mme. de Staël's familiar head-dress, twisted and wrapped around her head à la Turque, is said to have had its origin in the improvisation of the court hairdresser. Desperately groping for another version of the top-heavy erection, to humour the lovely queen, he seized upon a piece of fine lace and muslin hanging on a chair at hand, and twisting it, wrapped the thing about the towering wig. As it happened, the chiffon was my lady's chemise!
We begin the eighteenth century with a full petticoat, trimmed with rows of ruffles or bands; an overskirt looped back into paniers to form the bustle effect; the natural hair powdered; and head-dress of lace, standing out stiffly in front and drooping in a curtain behind.
It was not until the whim of Marie Antoinette decreed it so, that the enormous powdered wigs appeared.
Viennese temperament alone accounts for the moods of this lovely tragic queen, who played at making butter, in a cap and apron, over simple muslin frocks, but outdid her artificial age in love of artifice (not Art) in dress.
This gay and dainty puppet of relentless Fate propelled by varying moods must needs lose her lovely head at last, as symbol of her time.
PLATE XXVMrs. Vernon Castle in a summer afternoon costume appropriate for city or country and so adapted to the wearer's type that she is a picture, whether in action; seated on her own porch; having tea at the country club; or in the Winter sun-parlour.Mrs. Vernon Castle in Afternoon Costume--SummerMrs. Vernon Castle in Afternoon Costume—Summer
Mrs. Vernon Castle in a summer afternoon costume appropriate for city or country and so adapted to the wearer's type that she is a picture, whether in action; seated on her own porch; having tea at the country club; or in the Winter sun-parlour.
Mrs. Vernon Castle in Afternoon Costume--SummerMrs. Vernon Castle in Afternoon Costume—Summer
THEfirst seventy years of the nineteenth century seem to us of 1917 absolutely incredible in regard to dress. How our great-great-grandmothers ever got about on foot, in a carriage or stage-coach, moved in a crowd or even sat in any measure of serenity at home, is a mystery to us of an age when comfort, convenience, fitness and chic have at last come to terms. For a vivid picture of how our American society looked between 1800 and 1870, read Miss Elizabeth McClellan'sHistoric Dress in America, published in 1910 by George W. Jacobs & Co., of Philadelphia. The book is fascinating and it not only amuses and informs, but increases one's self-respect, if a woman, formodernwoman dressed in accordance with her rôle.
We can see extravagant wives point out with glee to tyrant mates how, in the span of yearsbetween 1800 and 1870 our maternal forebears made money fly, even in the Quaker City. Fancy paying in Philadelphia at that time, $1500 for a lace scarf, $400 for a shawl, $100 for the average gown of silk, and $50 for a French bonnet! Miss McClellan, quoting fromMrs. Roger Pryor's Memoirs, tells how she, Mrs. Pryor, as a young girl in Washington, was awakened at midnight by a note from the daughter of her French milliner to say that a box of bonnets had arrived from Paris. Mamma had not yet unpacked them and if she would come at once, she might have her pick of the treasures, and Mamma not know until too late to interfere. And this was only back in the 50's, we should say.
Then think of the hoops, and wigs and absurdly furbished head-dresses; paper-soled shoes, some intended only tositin; bonnets enormous; laces of cobweb; shawls from India by camel and sailing craft; rouge, too, and hair grease, patches and powder; laced waists and cramped feet; low necks and short sleeves for children in school-rooms.
Man was then still decorative here and inwestern Europe. To-day he is not decorative, unless in sports clothes or military uniform; woman's garments furnish all the colour. Whistler circumvented this fact when painting Theodore Duret (Metropolitan Museum) in sombre black broadcloth,—modern evening attire, by flinging over the arm of Duret, the delicate pink taffeta and chiffon cloak of a woman, and in M. Duret's hand he places a closed fan of pomegranate red.
"EUROPEANdress" is the term accepted to imply the costume of man and woman which is entirely cosmopolitan, decrying continuity of types (of costume) and thoroughly plastic in the hands of fashion.
To-day, we say parrot-like, that certain materials, lines and colours are masculine or feminine. They are so merely by association. The modern costuming of man the world over, if he appear in European dress (we except court regalia), is confined to cloth, linen or cotton, in black, white and inconspicuous colours; a prescribed and simple type of neckwear, footwear, hat, stick, and hair cut.
The progenitor of the garments of modern men was the Lutheran-Puritan-Revolutionary garb, the hall-mark of democracy.
It is true that when silk was first introducedinto Europe, from the Orient, the Greeks and early Romans considered it too effeminate for man's use, but this had to do with the doctrine of austere denial for the good of the state. To wear the costume of indolence implied inactivity and induced it. As a matter of fact, some of the master spirits of Greece did wear silks.
In Ancient Egypt, Assyria, Media, Persia and the Far East, men and women wore the same materials, as in China and Japan to-day. Egyptian men and their contemporaries throughout Byzantium, wore gowns, in outline identical with those of the women. Among the Turks, trousers were always considered as appropriate for women as for men, and both men and women wore over the trousers, a long garment not unlike those of the women in the Gothic period.
Thaïs wore a gilded wig, but so did the men she knew, and they added gilded false beards.
Assyrian kings wore earrings, bracelets and wonderful clasps with chains, by which the folds of their draped garment,—cut like thewoman's, might be caught up and held securely, leaving feet, arms and hands free for action.
When the genius of the Byzantine, Greek and Venetian manufacturers of silks and velvets, rich in texture and ablaze with colour, were offered for sale to the Romans, whose passion for display had increased with their fortunes, and consequent lives of dissipation, we find there was no distinction made between the materials used by man and woman.
It is no exaggeration to say that the Renaissance spells brocade. Great designs and small ones sprawled over the figures of man and woman alike.
Lace was as much his as hers to use for wide, elaborate collars and cuffs. Embroidery belonged to both, and the men (like the women) of Germany, France, Italy and England wore many plumes on their big straw hats and metal helmets. The intercommunication between the Orient and all of the countries of the Western Hemisphere, and the abundance and variety of human trappings bewildered and vitiated taste.
PLATE XXVIMrs. Vernon Castle costumed à la guerre for a walk in the country.The cap is after one worn by her aviator husband.This is one of the costumes—there are many—being worn by women engaged in war work under the head of messengers, chauffeurs, etc.The shoes are most decidedly not for service, but they will be replaced when the time is at hand, for others of stout leather with heavy soles and flat heels.Mrs. Vernon Castle Costumed a la Guerre for a WalkMrs. Vernon Castle Costumed á la Guerre for a Walk
Mrs. Vernon Castle costumed à la guerre for a walk in the country.
The cap is after one worn by her aviator husband.
This is one of the costumes—there are many—being worn by women engaged in war work under the head of messengers, chauffeurs, etc.
The shoes are most decidedly not for service, but they will be replaced when the time is at hand, for others of stout leather with heavy soles and flat heels.
Mrs. Vernon Castle Costumed a la Guerre for a WalkMrs. Vernon Castle Costumed á la Guerre for a Walk
Unfortunately the change in line of costume has not moved parallel to the line in furniture. The revival of classic interior decoration in Italy, Spain, France, Germany, England, etc., did not at once revive the classic lines in woman's clothes.
THEidea that man decorative, by reason of colour or line in costume, is of necessity either masquerading or effeminate, proceeds chiefly from the conventional nineteenth and twentieth century point of view in America and western Europe. But even in those parts of the world we are accustomed to colour in the uniforms of army and navy, the crimson "hood" of the university doctor, and red sash of the French Legion of Honour. We accept colour as a dignified attribute of man's attire in the cases cited, and we do not forget that our early nineteenth century American masculine forebears wore bright blue or vivid green coats, silver and brass buttons and red or yellow waistcoats. The gentleman sportsman of the early nineteenth century hunted in bright blue tailed coats with brass buttons, scarlet waistcoat, tight breeches and top hat!We refer to the same class of man who to-day wears rough, natural coloured tweeds, leather coat and close cap that his prey may not see him.
In a sense, colour is a sign of virility when used by man. We have the North American Indian with his gay feathers, blankets and war paint, and the European peasant in his gala costume. In many cases colour is as much his as his woman's. Some years ago, when collecting data concerning national characteristics as expressed in the art of the Slavs, Magyars and Czechs, the writer studied these peoples in their native settings. We went first to Hungary and were disappointed to find Buda Pest far too cosmopolitan to be of value for the study of national costume, music or drama. The dominating and most artistic element in Hungary is the Magyar, and we were there to study him. But even the Gypsies who played the Magyar music in our hotel orchestra, wore the black evening dress of western Europe and patent leather shoes, and the music they played was from the most modern operettas. It was not until a world-famous Hungarian violinistarrived to give concerts in Buda Pest that the national spirit of the Gypsies was stirred to play the Magyar airs in his honour. (Gypsies take on the spirit of any adopted land). We then realised what they could make of the Recockzy march and other folk music.
The experience of that evening spurred us to penetrate into southern Hungary, the heart of Magyar land, armed with letters of introduction, from one of the ministers of education, to mayors of the peasant villages.
It was impossible to get on without an interpreter, as usually even the mayors knew only the Magyar language—not a word of German. That was the perfect region for getting at Magyar character expressed in the colour and line of costume, manner of living, point of view, folk song and dance. It is all still vividly clear to our mind's eye. We saw the first Magyar costumes in a village not far from Buda Pest. To make the few miles quickly, we had taken an electric trolley, vastly superior to anything in New York at the time of which we speak; and were let off in the centre of a group of small, low thatched cottages, white-washed,and having a broad band of one, two or three colours, extending from the ground to about three feet above it, and completely encircling the house. The favourite combination seemed to be blue and red, in parallel stripes. Near one of these houses we saw a very old woman with a long lashed whip in her hand, guarding two or three dark, curly, long-legged Hungarian pigs. She wore high boots, many short skirts, a shawl and a head-kerchief. Presently two other figures caught our eye: a man in a long cape to the tops of his boots, made of sheepskin, the wool inside, the outside decorated with bright-coloured wools, outlining crude designs. The black fur collar was the skin of a small black lamb, legs and tail showing, as when stripped off the little animal. The man wore a cone-shaped hat of black lamb and his hair reached to his shoulders. He smoked a very long-stemmed pipe with a china bowl, as he strolled along. Behind him a woman walked, bowed by the weight of an immense sack. She wore boots to the knees, many full short skirts, and a yellow and red silk head-kerchief. By her head-covering weknew her to be a married woman. They were a farmer and his wife! Among the Magyars the man is very decidedly the peacock; the woman is the pack-horse. On market days he lounges in the sunshine, wrapped in his long sheepskin cape, and smokes, while she plies the trade. In the farmers' homes of southern Hungary where we passed some time, we, as Americans, sat at table with the men of the house, while wife and daughter served. There was one large dish of food in the centre, into which every one dipped! The women of the peasant class never sit at table with their men; they serve them and eat afterwards, and they always address them in the second person as, "Will your graciousness have a cup of coffee?" Also they always walk behind the men. At country dances we have seen young girls in bright, very full skirts, with many ribbons braided into the hair, cluster shyly at a short distance from the dancing platform in the fair grounds, waiting to be beckoned or whistled to by one of the sturdy youths with skin-tight trousers, tucked into high boots, who by right of might, has stationed himself on the platform. When they have danced, generally a czardas, the girl goes back to the group of women, leaving the man on the platform in command of the situation! Yet already in 1897 women were being admitted to the University of Buda Pest. There in Hungary one could see woman run the whole gamut of her development, from man's slave to man's equal.
PLATE XXVIIMrs. Vernon Castle in one of her dancing costumes.She was snapped by the camera as she sprang into a pose of mere joyous abandon at the conclusion of a long series of more or less exacting poses.Mrs. Castle assures us that to repeat the effect produced here, in which camera, lucky chance and favourable wind combined, would be well-nigh impossible.A FantasyMrs. Vernon CastleA Fantasy
Mrs. Vernon Castle in one of her dancing costumes.
She was snapped by the camera as she sprang into a pose of mere joyous abandon at the conclusion of a long series of more or less exacting poses.
Mrs. Castle assures us that to repeat the effect produced here, in which camera, lucky chance and favourable wind combined, would be well-nigh impossible.
A FantasyMrs. Vernon CastleA Fantasy
We found the national colour scheme to have the same violent contrasts which characterise the folk music and the folk poetry of the Magyars.
Primitive man has no use for half-tones. It was the same with the Russian peasants and with the Poles. Our first morning in Krakau a great clattering of wheels and horses' hoofs on the cobbled court of our hotel, accompanied by the cracking of a whip and voices, drew us to our window. At first we thought a strolling circus had arrived, but no, that man with the red crown to his black fur cap, a peacock's feather fastened to it by a fantastic brooch, was just an ordinary farmer in Sunday garb. In the neighbourhood of Krakau the young men wear frock coats of white cloth,over bright red, short tight coats, and their light-coloured skin-tight trousers, worn inside knee boots, are embroidered in black down the fronts.
One afternoon we were the guests of a Polish painter, who had married a pretty peasant, his model. He was a gentleman by birth and breeding, had studied art in Paris and spoke French, German and English. His wife, a child of the soil, knew only the dialect of her own province, but with the sensitive response of a Pole, eagerly waited to have translated to her what the Americans were saying of life among women in their country. She served us with tea and liquor, the red heels of her high boots clicking on the wooden floor as she moved about. As colour and as line, of a kind, that young Polish woman was a feast to the eye; full scarlet skirt, standing out over many petticoats and reaching only to the tops of her knee boots, full white bodice, a sleeveless jacket to the waist line, made of brightly coloured cretonne, outlined with coloured beads; a bright yellow head-kerchief bound her soft brown hair; her eyes were brown, and her skin likea yellow peach. On her neck hung strings of coral and amber beads. There was indeed a decorative woman! As for her background, it was simple enough to throw into relief the brilliant vision that she was. Not, however, a scheme of interior decoration to copy! The walls were whitewashed; a large stove of masonry was built into one corner, and four beds and a cradle stood on the other side of the room, over which hung in a row five virgins, the central one being the Black Virgin beloved by the Poles. The legend is that the original was painted during the life of the Virgin, on a panel of dark wood. Here, too, was the marriage chest, decorated with a crude design in bright colours. The children, three or four of them, ran about in the national costume, miniatures of their mother, but barefoot.
It was the same in Hungary, when we were taken by the mayor of a Magyar town to visit the characteristic farmhouse of a highly prosperous farmer, said to be worth two hundred thousand dollars. The table was laid in the end of a room having four beds in it. On inquiring later, we were told that they werenot ordinarily used by the family, but were heaped with the reserve bedding. In other words, they were recognised by the natives as indicating a degree of affluence, and were a bit of ostentation, not the overcrowding of necessity.
FROMHungary we continued our quest of line and colour of folk costume into Russia.
Strangely enough, Russia throws off the imperial yoke of autocracy, declaring for democratic principles, at the very moment we undertake to put into words the vivid picturesqueness resulting largely from the causes of this astounding revolution. Have you been in Russia? Have you seen with your own eyes any phase of the violent contrasts which at last have caused the worm to turn? Our object being to study national characteristics as expressed in folk costume, folk song, folk dance, traditional customs and fêtes, we consulted students of these subjects, whom we chanced to meet in London, Paris, Vienna and Buda Pest, with the result that we turned our faces toward southern or "Little" Russia, as the part least affected by cosmopolitan influences.
Kiev was our headquarters, and it is well to say at once that we found what we sought,—ample opportunity to observe the genuine Russian, the sturdy, dogged, plodding son of toil, who, more than any other European peasant seems a part of the soil, which in sullen persistency he tills. We knew already the Russians of Petrograd and Moscow; one meets them in Paris, London, Vienna, at German and Austrian Cures and on the Riviera. They are everywhere and always distinctive by reason of their Slav temperament; a magnetic race quality which is Asiatic in its essence. We recognise it, we are stirred by it, we are drawn to it in their literature, their music, their painting and in the Russian people themselves. The quality is an integral part of Russian nature; polishing merely increases its attraction as with a gem. One instance of this is the folk melody as treated by Tschaikowsky compared with its simple form as sung or danced by the peasant.
PLATE XXVIIIA skating costume worn by Miss Weld of Boston, holder of the Woman's Figure Skating Championship.This photograph was taken in New York on March 23, 1917, when amateurs contested for the cup and Miss Weld won—this time over the men.The costume of wine-coloured velvet trimmed with mole-skin, a small close toque to match, was one of the most appropriate and attractive models of 1916-1917.Modern Skating Costume 1917 Winner of Amateur Championship of Fancy SkatingCourtesy of New York HeraldModern Skating Costume 1917 Winner of Amateur Championship of Fancy Skating
A skating costume worn by Miss Weld of Boston, holder of the Woman's Figure Skating Championship.
This photograph was taken in New York on March 23, 1917, when amateurs contested for the cup and Miss Weld won—this time over the men.
The costume of wine-coloured velvet trimmed with mole-skin, a small close toque to match, was one of the most appropriate and attractive models of 1916-1917.
Modern Skating Costume 1917 Winner of Amateur Championship of Fancy SkatingCourtesy of New York HeraldModern Skating Costume 1917 Winner of Amateur Championship of Fancy Skating
Some of the Russian women of the fashionable world are very decorative. Our first impression of this type was in Paris, at the Russian Church on Christmas (or was it some other holy day?) when to the amazement of the uninitiated the Russian women of the aristocracy appeared at the morning service hatless and in full evening dress, wearing jewels as if for a function at some secular court. Their masculine escorts appeared in full regalia, the light of the altar candles adding mystery to the glitter of gold lace and jewels. Those occasions are picturesque in the extreme.
The congregation stands, as in the Jewish synagogues, and those of highest rank are nearest the altar, invariably ablaze with gold, silver and precious stones, while on occasions the priest wears cloth of gold.
In Paris this background and the whole scene was accepted as a part of the pageant of that city, but in Kiev it was different. There we got the other side of the picture; the man and the woman who are really Russia, the element that finds an outlet in the folk music, for its age-old rebellious submission. One hears the soul of the Russian pulsating in the continued reiteration of the same theme; it is like the endless treadmill of a life withoutvistas. We were looking at the Russia of Maxim Gorky, the Russia that made Tolstoy a reformer; that has now forced its Czar to abdicate.
We reached Kiev just before the Easter of the Greek Church, the season when the pilgrims, often as many as fifty thousand of them, tramp over the frozen roads from all parts of the empire to expiate their sins, kneeling at the shrine of one of their mummied, sainted bishops.
The men and women alike, clad in grimy sheepskin coats, moved like cattle in straggling droves, over the roads which lead to Kiev. From a distance one cannot tell man from woman, but as they come closer, one sees that the woman has a bright kerchief tied round her head, and red or blue peasant embroidery dribbles below her sheepskin coat. She is as stocky as a Shetland pony and her face is weather-beaten, with high cheekbones and brown eyes. The man wears a black astrachan conical cap and his hair is long and bushy, from rubbing bear grease into it. He walks with a crooked staff, biblical in style,and carries his worldly goods in a small bundle flung over his shoulder. The woman carries her own small burden. As they shuffle past, a stench arises from the human herd. It comes from the sheepskin, which is worked in, slept in, and, what is more, often inherited from a parent who had also worn it as his winter hide. Added to the smell of the sheepskin is that of an unwashed human, and the reek of stale food, for the poorest of the Russian peasants have no chimneys to their houses. They cannot afford to let the costly heat escape.
Kiev, the holy city and capital of Ancient Russia, climbs from its ancestral beginnings, on the banks of the River Dneiper, up the steep sides and over the summit of a commanding hilltop, crowned by an immense gold cross, illumined with electricity by night, to flash its message of hope to foot-sore pilgrims. The driver of our drosky drove us over the rough cobbles so rapidly, despite the hill, that we were almost overturned. It is the manner of Russian drosky drivers. The cathedral, our goal, was snowy-white, with frescoes on the outer walls, onion-shaped domes of bronzeturned green; or gold, or blue with stars of gold.
We entered and found the body of the church well filled by peasants, women and men in sheepskin. One poor doe-eyed creature crouched to press his forehead twenty times at least on the stone floor of the church. Eagerly, like a flock of sheep, they all pushed forward to where a richly-robed priest held a cross of gold for each to kiss, taking their proffered kopeks.
The setting sun streamed through the ancient stained glass, dyeing their dirty sheepskin crimson, and purple, and green, until they looked like illuminations in old missals. To the eye and the mind of western Europe it was all incomprehensible. Yet those were the people of Russia who are to-day her mass of armed defenders; the element that has been counted on from the first by Russia and her allies stood penniless before an altar laid over with gold and silver and precious stones. Just before we got to Kiev, one of those men in sheepskins with uncut hair and dogged expression, who had a sense of valuesin human existence, broke into the church and stole jeweled chalices from the altar. They were traced to a pawnshop in a distant city and brought back. It was a common thing to see men halt in the street and stand uncovered, while a pitiful funeral cortege passed. A wooly, half-starved, often lame horse, was harnessed with rope to a simple four-wheeled farm wagon, a long-haired peasant at his head, women and children holding to the sides of the cart as they stumbled along in grief, and inside a rough wooden coffin covered with a black pall, on which was sewn the Greek cross, in white. Heartless, hopeless, weary and underfed, those peasants were taking their dead to be blessed for a price, by the priest in cloth of gold, without whose blessing there could be no burial.
THEpublic thinks of Mark Twain as being the apostle ofwhiteduring the last years of his life, but those who knew him well recall his delightfully original way of expressing an intense love forbright colours. This brings to mind a week-end at Mark Twain's beautiful Italian villa in Reading, Connecticut, when, one night during dinner, he held forth on the compelling fascination of colours and the American Indian's superior judgment in wearing them. After a lengthy elaboration—not to say exaggeration—of his theme, he ended by declaring in uncompromising terms, that colour, and plenty of it, crimson and yellow and blue, wrapped around man, as well as woman, was an obligation shirked by humanity. It was all put as only Mark Twain could have put it, with that serious vein showing through broad humour. This quality combined with an unmatched originality, made every moment passed in his company a memory to treasure. It was not alone his theme, but how he dealt with it, that fascinated one.
PLATE XXIXOne of the 1917 silhouettes.Naturally, since woman to-day dresses for her occupation—work or play—the characteristic silhouettes are many.This one is reproduced to illustrate our point that outline can be affected by the smallest detail.The sketch is by Elisabeth Searcy.A Modern Silhouette--1917 Tailor-madeDrawn from Life by Elisabeth SearcyA Modern Silhouette—1917 Tailor-made
One of the 1917 silhouettes.
Naturally, since woman to-day dresses for her occupation—work or play—the characteristic silhouettes are many.
This one is reproduced to illustrate our point that outline can be affected by the smallest detail.
The sketch is by Elisabeth Searcy.
A Modern Silhouette--1917 Tailor-madeDrawn from Life by Elisabeth SearcyA Modern Silhouette—1917 Tailor-made
Mark Twain was elemental and at the same time a great artist,—the embodiment of extreme contradictions, and his flair for gay colour was one proof of his elemental strain. We laughed that night as he made word pictures of how men and women should dress. Next morning, toward noon, on looking out of a window, we saw standing in the middle of the driveway a figure wrapped in crimson silk, his white hair flying in the wind, while smoke from a pipe encircled his head. Yes, it was Mark Twain, who in the midst of his writing, had been suddenly struck with the thought that the road needed mending, and had gone out to have another look at it! It was a blustering day in Spring, and cold, so one of the household was sent to persuade him to come in. We can see him now, returning reluctantly, wind-blown and vehement, gesticulating, and stopping every few steps to express his opinion of the men who had madethat road! The flaming red silk robe he wore was one his daughter had brought him from Liberty's, in London, and he adored it. Still wrapped in it, and seemingly unconscious of his unusual appearance, he joined us on the balcony, to resume a conversation of the night before.
The red-robed figure seated itself in a wicker chair and berated the idea that mortal man evercouldbe generous,—act without selfish motives. With the greatest reverence in his tone, sitting there in his whimsical costume of bright red silk, at high noon,—an immaculate French butler waiting at the door to announce lunch, Mark Twain concluded an analysis of modern religion with "—why the GodIbelieve in is too busy spinning spheres to have time to listen to human prayers."
How often his words have been in our mind since war has shaken our planet.
THEworld has the habit of deriding that which it does not understand. It is the most primitive way of bolstering one's limitations. How often the woman or man with a God-given sense of the beautiful, the fitting, harmony between costume and setting, is described as poseur or poseuse by those who lack the same instinct. In a sense, of course, everything man does, beyond obeying the rudimentary instincts of the savage, is an affectation, and it is not possible to claim that even our contemporary costuming of man or woman always hasraison d'être.
We accept as the natural, unaffected raiment for woman and man that which custom has taught us to recognise as appropriate, with or without reason for being. For example, the tall, shiny, inflexible silk hat of man, and the tortuous high French heels of woman are in themselves neither beautiful, fitting, nor madeto meet the special demands of any setting or circumstance. Both hat and heels are fashions, unbeautiful and uncomfortable, but to the eye of man to-day serve as insignia of formal dress, decreed by society.
The artist nature has always assumed poetic license in the matter of dress, and as a rule defied custom, to follow an inborn feeling for beauty. That much-maligned short velvet coat and soft loose tie of the painter or writer, happen to have a most decidedraison d'être; they represent comfort, convenience, and in the case of the velvet coat, satisfy a sensitiveness to texture, incomprehensible to other natures. As for the long hair of some artists, it can be a pose, but it has in many cases been absorption in work, or poverty—the actual lack of money for the conventional haircut. In cities we consider long hair on a man as effeminate, an indication of physical weakness, but the Russian peasant, most sturdy of individuals, wears his hair long, and so do many others among extremely primitive masculine types, who live their lives beyond the reach of Fashion and barbers.
The short hair of the sincere woman artist is to save time at the toilette.
There is always a limited number of men and women who, in ordinary acts of life, respond to texture, colour or line, as others do to music or scenery, and to be at their best in life, must dress their parts as they feel them. Japanese actors who play the parts of women, dress like women off the stage, and live the lives of women as nearly as possible, in order to acquire the feeling for women's garments; they train their bodies to the proper feminine carriage, counting upon this to perfect their interpretations.
The woman who rides, hunts, shoots, fishes, sails her own boat, paddles, golfs and plays tennis, is very apt to look more at home in habit, tweeds and flannels, than she does in strictly feminine attire; the muscles she has acquired in legs and arms, from violent exercise, give an actual, not an assumed, stride and a swing to the upper body. In sports clothes, or severely tailored costume, this woman is at her best. Most trying for her will be demi-toilette (house gowns). She is beautiful atnight because a certain balance, dignity and grace are lent her by the décolletage and train of a dinner or ball gown. English women who are devotees of sport, demonstrate the above fact over and over again.
While on the subject of responsiveness to texture and colour we would remind the reader that Richard Wagner hung the room in which he worked at his operas with bright silks, for the art stimulus he got from colour, and it is a well-known fact that he derived great pleasure from wearing dressing gowns and other garments made from rich materials.
Clyde Fitch, our American playwright, when in his home, often wore velvet or brocaded silks. They were more sympathetic to his artist nature, more in accord with his fondness for wearing jewelled studs, buttons, scarf-pins. In his town and country houses the main scheme, leading features and every smallest detail were the result of Clyde Fitch's personal taste and effort, and he, more than most men and women, appreciated what a blot an inartistic human being can be on a room which of itself is a work of art.