(_Sweet Seventeen to the would-be Sumptuary Reformers at the Kensington
Town Hall._)
Vainly on Fashion you make war,
With querulous Book, and quaint Bazaar,
Good Ladies of the Higher Light!
A Turkish Tea-gown, loose or tight,
Won't win us to the Rational Cult;
Japanese skirts do but insult
Our elder instincts, to which _Reason_
Is nothing more nor less than treason.
Your "muddy weather costume" moves us
No more than satire, which reproves us
_Ad nauseam_, and for whose rebuff
We never care one pinch of snuff.
No, Ladies HARBERTON and COFFIN.
Your pleading, like the critics' "scoffin"
Touches us not; have we not smiled,
Mocking, at Mrs. OSCAR WILDE?
And shall we welcome with delight
Queer robes that make a girl "a fright?"
Pooh-pooh! We're simply imperturbable,
The Reign of Fashion's undisturbable.
The "Coming Dress?"--that's all sheer humming,
We only care for Dress _be_-Coming!
* * * * *