Of Woman.

I. I DETEST what has become of ordinary women warped out of all proportion by vanity and the internet. Of course it is as nothing to the detestation I feel for the ingrate men who feed this vile tendency. They think they can plaster themselves in paint and filter themselves with computers and favourable lenses out of all reality, but they should realise they deceive only themselves, they increase only their ignominy, and they lose everything else.

II. THERE IS NOTHING perhaps so unattractive as self-adoration, nothing so conducive to the formation of a negative judgment than vanity of appearance, and, paradoxically enough, nothing so likely to mar beauty and make human appearance ridiculous than this very animalism of the mating ritual. When people are out drinking, wearing their threadbare garments so nauseating to the admirer of Civilisation, I occasionally have twice to rub my eyes in incredulity, for I sometimes think I see only peacocks.

III. IT HAS been debated at times by gentlemen of a curious turn whether in truth it is better that a woman should be beautiful, dutiful, or intelligent, but I think they misalign their adjectives. Intelligence and dutifulness or fidelity are always beautiful, whereas bodily and facial beauty can be often ugly when fitted to ugly characters.

IV. REAL BEAUTY of appearance, not that confectionary beauty only effective against the unperceptive, is an hundred times magnified by manners, a thousand times magnified by modesty, and ten thousand times magnified by real intelligence, as also by softness, kindness, and gentleness of disposition, the true descendants of Eve, real angels dwelling upon the earth. Yet not lacking courage for noble conviction, as her Late Majesty the Queen, defender of the faith and honour of her devoted kingdoms. The perfect woman is possessed of all the fineries of mankind and dispossessed of all their grossness, retains all the strength of courage and discards all the violence of brutishness, and dresses herself out of love for artistic ideals rather than out of vulgar desire for attention.

V. STRANGE IT IS that now associated with female fashion are some of the coarsest and most masculine things imaginable: tattoos, things that used to only designate slaves in ancient times or pressganged sailors at the lowest rung in the King's Navy, now it seems are to be considered a feature of taste. To be sure, a permanent and poisonous scar, poorly illustrated on the skin, is a very noticeable thing, but so is a man walking backwards with rickets. In time and with age these hideous etchings become more hideous as they fade, and the damaged skin becomes even more damaged. Certain it is that all they indicate is a lack of style, a lack of idealism, and a presence of very definite vulgarity. Many will reflect that it seems a strange and desperate resort for a woman craving notice at any price, even at the spoliation of her natural beauty. So too with vast numbers of piercings; what woman ever thought a man wanted her to look like the bullock in the field with a ring through its nose and a tag on its ear? A single ornament in each ear lobe, a pearl or a diamond for example, is as far as that trend ought to be carried.

VI. MODERN STYLE is a contradiction in terms but I am willing it should be called modern fashion. If a lady is now not to wear almost nothing (because she has somehow returned the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil to its tree, and once again is naked and not ashamed) then she will wear the most bizarre, the most synthetic, and the most garish garments imaginable. Sports wear it is often called, leggings, tracksuits, skin-tight tops, how I abhor all these cheapened and vulgarised items for ladies' fashion. The bikini, named after an atoll obliterated in a nuclear bomb test, is a preposterous obscenity. I have thought aforetime that the great advantage of what is now considered traditional fashion, that is, gentlemen's suits and ladies' dresses, is in their utilisation of lines, and certainly there is nothing more breathtaking than a beautiful lady beautifully dressed; as there is nothing more nauseating than a beautiful lady degraded into a harlot. This has been recognised since ancient times, which is why the dreadful tale of Lucrece was considered a tragedy above all others; but not to-day it seems.

VII. EVERY MAN looks like some kind of animal I have always thought. I have seen moles, rats, hippopotami, elephants, tigers, gazelles, crickets, and lions, in my time, to name a few, all donning human garb and speaking tolerable English. With woman of late however the example of a fish seems to be the most desired after, for they all photograph themselves with a trout pout. Also that of a certain kind of monkey when I see these ridiculous women who walk around as though their posteriors are carrying them rather than otherwise, like so many absurd baboons in the throes of the season. Photography indeed is a vicious evil I am convinced at this stage in history, for it has annihilated the economy for classical painting and made everyone drown in the pool of Narcissus. I so utterly detest the self-infatuation that fable warns against because, in my admittedly cynical opinion, it seems it causes detestation for anything evidently more beautiful than its overly gazed upon object. Therefore socialists despise palaces, inverted snobs resent the status of princes, and harlots detest monogamous fidelity as vampires the light.