telligent expressing of herself in her
_mise-en-scene_. _Seduisant_, instead of _chic_ is the word for this
woman.

Your black-haired woman with white skin and dark, brilliant eyes, is the
one who can best wear emerald green and other strong colours. The now
fashionable mustard, sage green, and bright magentas are also the
_affaire_ of this woman with clear skin, brilliant colour and sparkling
eyes.

These same colours, if subdued, are lovely on the middle-aged woman with
black hair, quiet eyes and pale complexion, but if her hair is grey or
white, mustard and sage green are not for her, and the magenta must be
the deep purplish sort, which combines with her violets and mauves, or
delicate pinks and faded blues. She will be at her best in shades of
grey which tone with her hair.

CHAPTER IV

THE PSYCHOLOGY OF CLOTHES

Has the reader ever observed the effect of clothes upon manners? It is
amazing, and only proves how pathetically childlike human nature is.

Put any woman into a Marie Antoinette costume and see how, during an
evening she will gradually take on the mannerisms of that time. This
very point was brought up recently in conversation with an artist, who
in referring to one of the most successful costume balls ever given in
New York--the crinoline ball at the old Astor House--spoke of how our
unromantic Wall Street men fell to the spell of stocks, ruffled shirts
and knickerbockers, and as the evening advanced, were quite themselves
in the minuette and polka, bowing low in solemn rigidity, leading their
lady with high arched arm, grasping her pinched-in waist, and swinging
her beruffled, crinolined form in quite the 1860 manner.

Some women, even girls of tender years, have a natural instinct for
costuming themselves, so that they contribute in a decorative way to any
setting which chance makes theirs. Watch children "dressing up" and see
how among a large number, perhaps not more than one of them will have
this gift for effects. It will be she who knows at a glance which of the
available odds and ends she wants for herself, and with a sure, swift
hand will wrap a bright shawl about her, tie a flaming bit of silk about
her dark head, and with an assumed manner, born of her garb, cast a
magic spell over the small band which she leads on, to that which,
without her intense conviction and their susceptibility to her mental
attitude toward the masquerade, could never be done.

This illustrates the po