us to see how Bloomer faced the difficulty;
it never seemed to give her a moment's thought: she went straight at it,
and reached the opposite side with just as much ease as her companion.

Now, reader, let us change the scene and bring before you one with which
you are probably not unfamiliar. Place--A muddy crossing near a parish
school. Time--Play hours. _Dramatis personae_--An old lady and twenty
school-boys. Scene--The old lady comes sailing along the footways,
doing for nothing that for which sweepers are paid; arrived at the
crossing, a cold shudder comes over her as she gazes in despair at the
sea of mud she must traverse; behold now the frantic efforts she is
making to gather up the endless mass of gown, petticoats, and
auxiliaries with which custom and fashion have smothered her; her hands
can scarcely grasp the puckers and the folds; at last she makes a start,
exhibiting a beautifully filled pair of snow-white stockings; on she
goes, the journey is half over; suddenly a score of urchin voices are
heard in chorus, "Twig her legs, twig her legs." The irate dame turns
round to reprove them by words, or wither them with a glance; but alas!
in her indignation she raises a threatening hand, forgetful of the
important duties it was fulfilling, and down go gown, petticoats, and
auxiliaries in the filthy mire; the boys of course roar with
delight--it's the jolliest fun they have had for many a day; the old
lady gathers up her bundle in haste, and reaches the opposite side with
a filthy dress and a furious temper. Let any mind, unwarped by prejudice
and untrammelled by custom, decide whether the costume of the Rochester
Bloomer or of the old lady be the more sensible.

I grant that I have placed before you the two extremes, and I should be
as sorry to see my fair friends in "cut o' knee" kilts, as I now am to
see them in "sweep-the-ground gowns," &c. "But," cries one, "you will
aim a blow at female delicacy!" A blow, indeed! when all that female
delicacy has to depend upon is the issue of a struggle between pants and
petticoats, it will need no further blow: it is pure matter of fashion
and custom. Do not girls wear a Bloomer constantly till they are
fourteen or fifteen, then generally commence the longer dress? And what
reason can be given but custom, which, in so many articles of dress, is
ever changing? How long is it since the dressing of ladies' hair for
Court was a work of such absurd labour and nicety, that but f