In France we find gloves and shoes have a prominent place among the accessories of a lady’s toilette.  To be “bien chaussee et bien gantee” is essential to being well dressed.  Good, well fitting gloves and shoes tell more than most other things among the French.  At least a somewhat shabby and unpretending gown and bonnet, if accompanied by gloves that are of a good quality and colour and that fit well, and by shoes or boots that also fit well, and are of good style and make, will pass muster anywhere, while the reverse will fail.

It is remarkable that there is nothing which distinguishes a foreigner from an Englishwoman more than her gloves.  They “fit like a glove;” they are of a good colour, according well with the rest of the costume, neither too light nor too dark, but rather light than dark.  There are no ends or corners of the fingers which are not well filled; there are no creases indicative of the gloves being of a wrong size, nor are they put on crooked with a twist given to the fingers, so that the seams of the glove do not appear straight.  In short, a Frenchwoman does not put on her glove anyhow as an Englishwoman does.  To her it is a matter of great importance; to our country-woman it is a matter of indifference.  We think the Frenchwoman right, because it is by what are called trifles that good and also great effects are produced.

We come now to an accessory of considerable importance—­the hair.  As a great amount of time is expended upon hair-dressing, and as no one ever thinks of wearing it in its natural state, and as nothing is more under the influence of fashion than the hair, it has become by consent of all an accessory of great importance.  Will any one affirm that it is a matter of indifference how the hair is dressed?  Whether in plaits or bows?  Whether in a crop, or twisted up in a coil?  There is nothing which affects a lady’s personal appearance more than the style in which she dresses her hair.  We confess that we have a strong prejudice against a too submissive following of the fashion.  Because in the first place we deny that fashion is always in the right, and in the second it rarely happens that the same style exactly suits two persons alike.

Nothing requires more consideration than the hair.  It is one of a woman’s greatest ornaments.  We have high authority for saying this.  Hair should always have the appearance of being well cared for.  It should set off the shape of the head if it is good, and not aggravate any of its defects.  A small head, well set on, is a great beauty.  It tends more than anything else to that distinguished look which enhances all other beauty.  Beauty, if accompanied by a look of refinement, is worth more than mere animal beauty, and nothing is more indicative of refinement and noble birth as a well-shaped head.  It is the head which gives the impression of intellectual power.  The well formed brow should not be demoralized by ringlets, which are suggestive only of a wax doll,