第40章 ON DRESS AND DEPORTMENT(2)

But all those merry, foolish days of youth are gone, and we are very sober, very solemn--and very stupid, some say--now.The world is a grave, middle-aged gentleman in this nineteenth century, and would be shocked to see itself with a bit of finery on.So it dresses in black coats and trousers, and black hats, and black boots, and, dear me, it is such a very respectable gentleman--to think it could ever have gone gadding about as a troubadour or a knight-errant, dressed in all those fancy colors! Ah, well! we are more sensible in this age.

Or at least we think ourselves so.It is a general theory nowadays that sense and dullness go together.

Goodness is another quality that always goes with blackness.Very good people indeed, you will notice, dress altogether in black, even to gloves and neckties, and they will probably take to black shirts before long.Medium goods indulge in light trousers on week-days, and some of them even go so far as to wear fancy waistcoats.On the other hand, people who care nothing for a future state go about in light suits; and there have beenknown wretches so abandoned as to wear a white hat.Such people, however, are never spoken of in genteel society, and perhaps I ought not to have referred to them here.

By the way, talking of light suits, have you ever noticed how people stare at you the first time you go out in a new light suit They do not notice it so much afterward.The population of London have got accustomed to it by the third time you wear it.I say "you," because I am not speaking from my own experience.I do not wear such things at all myself.As I said, only sinful people do so.

I wish, though, it were not so, and that one could be good, and respectable, and sensible without making one's self a guy.I look in the glass sometimes at my two long, cylindrical bags (so picturesquely rugged about the knees), my stand-up collar and billycock hat, and wonder what right I have to go about making God's world hideous.Then wild and wicked thoughts come into my heart.I don't want to be good and respectable.(I never can be sensible, I'm told; so that don't matter.) I want to put on lavender-colored tights, with red velvet breeches and a green doublet slashed with yellow; to have a light-blue silk cloak on my shoulder, and a black eagle's plume waving from my hat, and a big sword, and a falcon, and a lance, and a prancing horse, so that I might go about and gladden the eyes of the people.Why should we all try to look like ants crawling over a dust-heap? Why shouldn't we dress a little gayly? I am sure if we did we should be happier.True, it is a little thing, but we are a little race, and what is the use of our pretending otherwise and spoiling fun? Let philosophers get themselves up like old crows if they like.But let me be a butterfly.

Women, at all events, ought to dress prettily.It is their duty.They are the flowers of the earth and were meant to show it up.We abuse them a good deal, we men; but, goodness knows, the old world would be dull enough without their dresses and fair faces.How they brighten up every place they come into! What a sunny commotion they--relations, of course---make in our dingy bachelor chambers! and what a delightful litter their ribbons and laces, and gloves and hats, and parasols and 'kerchiefs make! It is as if a wandering rainbow had dropped in to pay us a visit.

It is one of the chief charms of the summer, to my mind, the way our little maids come out in pretty colors.I like to see the pink and blue and white glancing between the trees, dotting the green fields, and flashing back the sunlight.You can see the bright colors such a long way off.There are four white dresses climbing a hill in front of my window now.I can see them distinctly, though it is three miles away.I thought at first they were mile-stones out for a lark.It's so nice to be able to see the darlings a long way off.Especially if they happen to be your wife and your mother- in-law.

Talking of fields and mile-stones reminds me that I want to say, in all seriousness, a few words about women's boots.The women of these islands all wear boots too big for them.They can never get a boot to fit.The bootmakers do not keep sizes small enough.

Over and over again have I known women sit down on the top rail of a stile and declare they could not go a step further because their boots hurt them so; and it has always been the same complaint--too big.

It is time this state of things was altered.In the name of the husbands and fathers of England, I call upon the bootmakers to reform.Our wives, our daughters, and our cousins are not to be lamed and tortured with impunity.Why cannot "narrow twos" be kept more in stock? That is the size I find most women take.

The waist-band is another item of feminine apparel that is always too big.The dressmakers make these things so loose that the hooks and eyes by which they are fastened burst off, every now and then, with a report like thunder.