London, June 7.
'There is no doubt that the big picture hat. which the Duchess Kent and a few rather timid imita tors reintroduced last year, Is deffnitély the right thing' for "func tions" this" year, This week, at a very pretty wedding and a" huge garden party which I attended, there were numerous examples of this beautiful fashion. It Is to be worn at Ascot and at the two Royal garden parties at which the début-antes are-to be presented, In anything of a breeze it is, frankly, a beast of 'a hat, especially since we no more wear the colls of Jong hair to. which our. mothers could spear their hats with enormous pins. But it is such a lovely: object in itself, and is so universally becoming, adding beauty to a beautiful face and discovering it for a plain one, that one may fully welcome Its return, But the big hat brings its own problems. Naturally it demands full soft lines in dresses. The notion of short frock with a picture hat has only to be mentioned to show how laughable it would be. "At the weding just mentioned T saw two lovely dresses, of marocain, with widely flared skirts, one dark" blue with with a sort of bamboo pattern in white. "Gneidentally the designs summer dress stuffs this year are particularly charming), With picture bats on top the eect was delight ful.
These problems, of the big hat, the costumiers can easily solve; and the beauty parlours will have' no ditlculty in prescribing the right makeup and style for the hair both of Which, of course, are quite different for a big hat and for a small one, What is not at all easy is that girls will have to learn how to wall, how to hold themselves, with fai backs and shoulders well set back. The drooping lly figure, the poked head, the athletic strid 5 im-Possible with a big hat as the short skirt, In fact, girls will have to learn to be regal which in these goas-you-please days they have quite forgotten how to be. To crass their legs when seated will become a Smpossible as for their mothers It was deemed improper. The adjective "queenly" may even come into again, All of which ts an_ interesting example of what hats can mean for human behaviour, the only example perhaps of cause and effect in which you build from the top downwards, Horse Show Competitors It is a pity that riding is so expensive. It is the oldest of all athletic pursulls for women and, may tone add? by far the most suitable, the one in which they look at their very best and which affords the nest physical training, and mental too. Tis an old saying that no one' can master a horse without first mastering himself, The Royal Victorian Order It Is curious to think that Queen Victoria who instituted the Royal Victorian Order in 1896 being herself outstanding an example of what a woman can do, did not throw it open to women. But in the "gay nineties" women hed not even begun te come to the front as they have row, and of course the great Queen had the strongest views on where a woman's duties should lo, remembering to the end of her' life her husband, the large family and the plain family dinners at Osborne, Windsor and Balmoral.
So it has been left to her great grandson to admit women to the Grder. In the two highest classes, Knight Grand Cross and Knight Commander, a lady will be entitled to be called "Dame," with her Chris tian name to follow, and the Anal letters "G, C. V, 0. and D. C. V. respectively. To gain this distinelon, the candidate must have rendered extraordinary, oF important, 'OF personal services' to His Majesty hhis "heirs and successors." Women are eligible for the Order of the British Empire, the Order of Merit and the Order of the Companions of Honour, In the frst they are fairly plentiful, but holders of the "two last are very rare.
Apropos of the Royal Victorian Order, I heard a good story of the Into King this week, For some reason he disliked this particular Order. He also hated being followed about, His Majesty was walking at Cowes tone day when he noticed a man following closely behind him. "Who the deuce is that fellow?" he de manded of his secretary who was with him. "It is Sir Somebody So, And-so, Sir," returned the secretary, "Don't you' remember that you gave him the Victorian Order last week?" "Did 1" explained the King serve the fellow righ Marringe and Divorce Lord Merrivale, who was for 14 years President" of the Probate, Divorce and Admiralty Division, has Produced in retirement a little book "Marriage and Divorce" in which he puts the views formed of his long experience, In some respects his recommendations will strike the moder reader as severe, In cases
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.