I have given the full extract, as it contains much matter for thought for my readers, both young and middle-aged.  I suppose everyone read with interest the celebration of the centenary of M. Chevreul, the great French chemist, who has been for years a great student of colour, and to whom we owe many alterations, inventions, and suggestions in dyes and colours.  Trade has been assisted and developed by his researches, and the subject of colour harmonies has been placed by him in the position and basis of a science.  When we admire the loveliness of our coloured materials, and notice the wonderful improvements of late years, we women may thank the industry and talent of M. Chevreul.  I put in a long quotation from him some months ago, and it may interest some of my readers to hear that M. Chevreul has attained his hundredth year as a total abstainer, but drank his own health in a glass of champagne, tasted for the first time!

[Illustration:  A lady’s pyjama.]

From a recently-published book I gather the following ideas, and as they coincide with what I am always impressing on my readers with reference to tight dresses and stays, I quote them gladly, as showing that there are other sensible women in the world, a class which I hope will every day increase:—­“If you lace tightly, nothing can save you from acquiring high shoulders, abnormally large hips, varicose veins in your legs, and a red nose.  Surely such penalties, to say nothing of heart disease, spinal curvature, and worse, are sufficiently dreadful to deter either maids or matrons from unduly compressing their waists?  No adult woman’s waist ought to measure less in circumference than twenty-four inches at the smallest, and even this is permissible to slender figures only.  The rule of beauty is that the waist should be twice the size of the throat.  Therefore, if the throat measure twelve and a half inches, round the waist should measure twenty-five.  The celebrated statue know as the ‘Venus de Medici,’ the acknowledged type of beauty and grace, has a waist of twenty-seven inches, the height of the figure being only five feet two inches.”

And, while on this subject, I must mention that some new stays, made of elastic material, have recently been advertised, which I should imagine were comfortable.  Dr. Jaeger also has an elastic knitted bodice on his list, which is in reality a description of stays, and would afford sufficient support to a slight figure.

The illustrations to our dress instructions of this month show the prevailing characteristics of the gowns of the month, and also demonstrate how little change there is in them.  As the majority of the community is still moving about at this season, most of the dress thought about and worn is suitable for travelling, as well as autumn.  Now that we no longer think it needful to put on all our old clothes and to make our appearance grotesque, as was formerly the case, we very frequently follow the French and American