Then as to colour. I think the present taste for soft, tertiary colours is altogether favourable. Strong colours, in a mass, are destructive to the delicacy of colour and expression in a woman's face. The vermilion of her lips should not have to fight the red that is suitable enough for pillar-posts. The blue of her eyes should not have to compete with that of Reckitt. The missing colour, yellow, should not be flaunted against her carnations and azure and pearly white. A woman is worth more than to be subordinated to an aniline dye. _The primary or secondary colours should be used (like brass instruments in a fine orchestra) very sparingly._ These are, of course, very general principles. But I am not an expert in millinery, and can only speak generally. I think, however, that there is a tolerably safe test that might be applied in carrying them out, viz., What will the dress look like in a picture? Artists are every day finding their inspirations more and more in the living men and women of their own time. Women are every day making more history for men to paint. Let them dress so as to be paintable. Dress how they will, they are always admired, and reverenced, and loved. But I cannot say the same of their dress. The time has been when, in order to paint a woman, the first necessity for the artist was to get possession of her great-grandmother's gown. Under such circumstances the painting of contemporary life must be limited to portraiture; and everything that limits the range of art, limits its splendour and the hold it should have on our affections. There are only a few words that I care to add. I think we lose something as a nation in not having a distinctive dress for our peasantry and the _bourgeoises_ of our provincial towns--nothing, I mean, to correspond with the square of linen folded on the head, of which the Roman woman is so justly proud, or the white caps of Normandy and Holland, varying in shape according to the township. The picturesque way in which the shawl is used by our Lancashire lasses is, indeed, some approach to it. But I recognise the impossibility of the Continental system being established amongst us. Would it, however, be too much to hope that the ladies of England may see fit to adopt the beautiful custom of wearing a special garment for church services? It would be in itself so seemly; it would add so much to the grace and dignity of our worship; it would be so agreeable a contrast to the parterre of bonnets in the lecture-room, and the pretty grouping of black and brown and golden hair--yes, and of silver, too--in the opera-house, that I believe the suggestion has only to be fairly considered to be accepted. I ask, "Will the ladies see fit to do this?" because, after all, it is a woman's question. Men have a right to be considered, but _a woman's dress, to be beautiful, must be the expression of a woman's mind, and the work of a woman's hand_.--I am, Sir, yours faithfully,