the American divinity is sufficiently well defined to startle one. Such
a trick in China could but originate with the demimonde, yet it is taken
up by certain of the Americans who are constantly seeking for variety.
There can be no question but that the middle-class fashion designer
revenges himself upon the _beau monde_. They will not receive him
socially, so he forces them to wear his clothes.

Some years ago women were made to wear "hoops," pictures of which I
have seen in old publications. Imagine, if you can, a bird-cage three
feet high and four feet across, formed of bone of the whale or some
metal. This was worn beneath the dress, expanding it on either side so
that it was difficult to approach a lady. A later order was given to
wear a camel-like "hump" at the base of the vertebral column, which was
called the "bustle"--a contrivance calculated to unnerve the wearer, not
to speak of the looker-on; yet the American woman adopted it, distorted
her body, and aped the gait of the kangaroo, the form being called the
"Grecian bend." This lasted six months or more; first adopted by the
aristocracy, then by the common people, and by the time the latter had
it well in hand the _bon ton_ had cast it aside and were trying
something else.

A close study of this mad dressing shows that there is always a "hump."
At one time it went all around; later appeared only behind, like an
excrescence on a bilbol-tree. At the present time the designer has drawn
his picture showing it as a pendent bag from the "shirtwaist," like the
pouch of the bird pelican. A few years ago the designer, in a delirium,
placed the humps on the tops of the sleeves, then snatched them away and
tipped them upside down. Finally he appeared to go utterly mad with the
desire to humiliate the woman, and created a fashion that entailed
dragging the skirt on the ground from one to two feet.

Did the American woman resent the insult; did she refuse to adopt a
custom not only disgusting but really filthy, one that a Chinese lady
would have died rather than have accepted? By no means; she seized upon
it with the ardor of a child with a new toy, and for a year the
side-paths of the great cities of the country were swept by women's
skirts, clouds of dust following them. The press took up the question,
but without effect; the fashion dragged its nauseating and frightful
course from rich and poor, and I was told by an official that it was
impossible to stop it or to f