not only plans and designs the dresses, but supervises the work-rooms and attends to all the purchases of material, besides being constantly summoned to attend to the wants of purchasers, who refuse to give their orders without having the benefit of M. Worth's judgment and supervision while making their selections. They are right, too, for he understands wonderfully well the shapes and colors best suited to different forms and complexions, though he has rather a perverse penchant for arraying blondes in certain bright shades of yellow.
"And what are the prices one is forced to pay to this sovereign of silks?" methinks I hear an impatient reader cry. It must be confessed they are rather startling. Style has to be paid for in Paris as well as silk and lace, and commands a relatively higher price, so that Worth's dresses range from forty to fifty dollars higher than toilettes of the same materials and for the same occasions purchased elsewhere. Exclusive of laces, the cost of which may be run up to any limit, his price for a silk walking or evening dress may be computed as being from two to three hundred dollars, according to the style of trimming, while a cashmere or silk grenadine costume may be obtained for about fifty dollars less. Even at these prices he is literally overwhelmed with orders, and his rooms swarm with eager clients, Americans and Russians being his best customers, though Paris furnishes him with no inconsiderable number. There are ladies in the United States who import all their dresses from Worth; and when one adds to the original cost of these garments exchange, price of gold and the sixty-per-cent. duty payable in gold, the probable cost of their wardrobes becomes rather startling to the imagination. Add to the cost of such toilettes the prices of the bonnets of Mesdames Ode and Virot, which range from twenty to thirty, and even forty, dollars a bonnet, and one will see that dress is an expensive item, even when the articles are purchased in the land of their creation.
And in truth there is no limit to the amount that a lady may spend on her dress in Paris. As soon as lace is employed in trimming, the cost of a toilette may be run up to any sum one chooses to give for it, for instances have been known of a single lace flounce costing sixteen thousand dollars, and point d'Alençon at two and three hundred dollars a yard is by no means a scarce article or difficult to find. An extravagantly disposed female may, if she likes, get up a dress which will cost two or three thousand dollars without any difficulty. This is one extreme of the scale: the next division is to be found in those establishments which have a reputation only second to that of Worth, and where the prices are from two to three hundred francs less on each dress than are those of his renowned atelier. Dresses either for dinner, balls or promenading may be obtained at these houses for prices ranging from one hundred to one hundred and sixty dollars—this, of course, not including rich laces—while elegant and tasteful bonnets may be procured for sixteen, eighteen or twenty dollars. From this point downward the gradation is gradual till one reaches the Bon Marché and the Coin de Rue for dresses and the Passage du Saumon for bonnets.
Now comes the second question: On how little can a woman dress in Paris who can make neither her own dresses nor her own bonnets? She can buy very wearable undergarments for a mere trifle. Her linen handkerchiefs, marked with her initial in embroidery, will cost her thirty cents each, her two-button gloves eighty cents a pair, if kid. Her suit, in fine silky-looking, pale-colored mohair of the fashionable shades, neatly made and prettily and elaborately trimmed, will cost her fifteen dollars, and she can get a black silk costume for forty dollars, and a long black silk housedress with trimmed front for thirty-five. A good silk underskirt, prettily trimmed, for wearing under polonaises, wash dresses, etc., can be had for twelve dollars; and very elaborately trimmed it will cost her fifteen. If she wants a very cheap suit for ordinary wear, she can get a thoroughly nice and reasonable one,
