Teach Your Husband Elegance

Your husband's elegance, Madam, is part of your duty. It is the mark of your attention or your negligence, the mark of the completeness of your social maturity or of its deficiency, the mark of the abundance of your care or of its scarcity.

Yes, Madam — and this saying of mine admits of no dispute, for it is the very truth — your husband's elegance is the work of your hands, the axis of your taste, and the fruit of your encouragement and care. Why, then, do you overlook and neglect it? Is it because of your many occupations in society, or with the children, or in the kitchen, or on visits?

Have you any justification when your husband appears in a state far removed from elegance or cleanliness? Have you a sufficient excuse for his torn shirt, or his shabby jacket, or his shoes — their face disfigured, coated with dust, a part of them eaten away by time, and yet he still wears them and goes in them to the best gatherings?

Have you an excuse for the assortment of colors in which your husband goes out into the street, at war with sound taste — an assortment at which the beholder would gladly shut his eyes, to relieve them of the vexation that came upon them when they looked at that discordant assemblage: a loud pink shirt with greenish trousers, a brown collar, gray shoes, and a jacket whose color God alone knows? Did that assemblage not offend your own eyes before your husband left his house, and prompt you to change some of its parts — adding some, or removing some in favor of others that would suit the trousers or the jacket or the shoes? And would this operation consume so large a part of your time that you cannot spare it for such trifles?

Did the sight of the crumpled jacket not offend your eyes, and the trousers that have gone unpressed for weeks, until in that sagging shape they ceased to be trousers at all and came to resemble the baggy sirwal that never knew a flat-iron? Did that yellowed shirt not pain you, unchanged for days despite continuous work, the dust of the streets, and the smoke of the workshops?

Did the plight of that poor wretch never pass through your mind — so little does he receive of your tenderness and of your care for his affairs — while you sat before the mirror correcting what did not please you, dressing your hair, and spending the long hours upon your adornment and your finery, so as to appear as you love to appear, and win admiration, and draw all eyes? Have you not noticed the wide gulf and the evident difference between your appearance and the appearance of your husband or your son in the eyes of passers-by and friends? Do you not know that his disfigured aspect lowers the worth of your elegance, however great and complete it may be? Do you not know that your carelessness and your indifference in this respect invite criticism of you, expose your shortcoming, draw eyes upon you, and reveal the faults in you that repair-work and finery had concealed? Why, then, do you leave the gulf so wide, when you admit that your husband is a part of you and you of him? Are you content that a part of you should be disfigured and defective? Would you like two eyes, one of them beautiful and clear and the other with a mote in it? Or two legs, one slender and smooth and the other swollen with some disease? You and your husband are like those two eyes or those two legs: if one of you is disfigured, the other is disfigured too; and if

each of you preserves his beauty, that beauty shows forth attractive and pleasing. You and your husband are one fragrant flower, one of whose petals has withered, marring its aspect and leaving in it a plain and painful defect. It is within your power to remove this disfigurement and to keep that flower beautiful and fragrant, pleasing and satisfying, so that you hear words of praise and approval — if you attend to the following observations:

1 — Have him change his shirt daily.

2 — See that the shirt cuffs are a little longer than the jacket sleeves, and the collar somewhat higher than the collar of the jacket.

3 — Beware of his wearing a striped shirt with striped trousers.

4 — Have him wear braces instead of a belt, for they help the trousers to hang naturally.

5 — Do not let him neglect the garters of his socks, for a great part of men are forever appearing in wrinkled socks that detract from their elegance.

6 — Help him choose the suitable colors, employing in this your study and your taste.

7 — See to it that everything he wears is pressed and clean.

8 — White cotton handkerchiefs are as pleasant in use as silk, and easy to come by.

9 — If your husband is one of those who use scents, let him choose them of good quality, to spare others annoyance.

These are simple observations which you can apply, and to which you can accustom him, for they are a complementary part of your own elegance and beauty.