To your question, "What is your ideal of a beautiful woman?" I would answer, That form which, tall or short, or of light or dark colour, most emphasises human characteristics furthest removed from suggestions of the inferior creatures--a principle so well understood and acted upon by the great Greek artists. How beautiful when, in the words of Ruskin, "Fairest, because purest and thoughtfullest, trained in all high knowledge, as in all courteous art--in dance, in song, in sweet wit, in lofty learning, in loftier courage, in loftiest love--able alike to cheer, to enchant, or save the souls of men." This would, I think, do for an ideal.--Very truly yours, G. F. WATTS. In a second letter Mr. Watts adds:-- "It is impossible that we should be unaffected by the impressions the mind receives through the medium of dress; we ought not to be so. The indifference in modern times to grace and harmony in dress is a strong reason for concluding that pleasure in what is beautiful--or, which may sometimes be accepted as an equivalent, interesting--a sense so strong in former ages, is extinct. "I think I said that it was more easy to say what should not be, than what should be. Good taste must be outraged when deformity is suggested, but even that may be passed over when such things are perfectly extraneous. When they tend to produce permanent deformity, it is a pity they cannot be suppressed by law, as unquestionably the race suffers. No healthy, well-made young girl ought to be allowed to wear stays compressing the ribs; after thirty, there may be reasons; and by that time nature would have asserted herself, and no great harm would be done. But as long as men have the degraded taste to prefer a pipe to the beautiful flexible line, which might always, with the greatest delicacy, be evident, there can be no hope. Again, this thing is hardly short of wicked. Put together, you have this--uncommonly like a cloven hoof. I wish the ladies joy of it!" [Illustration] MR. G. D. LESLIE, R.A. Riverside, Wallingford. DEAR SIR,--I alluded to the subject of ladies' dress in an address I delivered at Southampton on Art. It is a short allusion, but if you care to publish it I have no objection, and could send you a copy.--I am, dear Sir, yours faithfully, G. D. LESLIE. The passage runs as follows:--