PARIS FASHIONS.
(From our own Correspondent.)
Muslins and bareges cannot be worn with any comfort at present, and in this dilemma our ladies fall back on that stock article, taffetas. It is often converted into shawls, to wear with the dresses ; the top half is pointed, and the lower half rounded and trimmed with guipure or deep black lace. Large and flowing taffetas mantles are only fit for neglige ; those intended for full dress are transparent on the shoulders. The transparency is sometimes composed of guipure and black lace insertion, or it is made of black tulle, and pointed before and behind like a fichu. The tulle itself is covered with a trellis-work of light trimming, and each square is ornamented with jet beads ; and when the sun shines they dazzle and glitter and produce a most charming effect. Attached to the fichu is an immense flounce of taffetas, which forms the mantle, and this can be bordered with lace or guipure, or it is very often left quite plain, which is a great saving of expense. In the country and by the sea-side, there is nothing so generally adopted as the light and coloured fancy burnous. This garment is varied in a thousand ways ; but the hood is abandoned for the pointed pelerine, which has not been revived for many a day. Even the casaques are made with black lace pelerines, fall and long, and falling as low as the waist, and we have seen some, to wear in-doors, of white muslin. The Louis XV. pelerine is a mixture of puffs and insertions, which are joined in sloping lines from the throat to the shoulder. It is finished off by a double flounce of white mus- lin, edged with Valenciennes, and it is intended to wear with a white boddice ; the sleeves of which should be open, puffed above, flounced below, and edged with lace. Children's fashions are principally regulated by la maison Pauline Bayer. The Zouavejacket is very becoming to little boys, and more- over it does not interfere with their freedom or comfort. The jacket is short, square, and braided, and it displays the full, white shirt beneath. The skirt is also braided to correspond. Embroidered blouses, cut rather low in the neck, are worn by little girls. Their better dresses are of poplin or silk, and in this case the corsage is low in front and completed by a basque all round. Braces, embroidered, and edged with tiny silk buttons, pass over the shoulders, and hang part way over the skirt at the back. A round hat, of Italian straw, trimmed with riband and wild flowers, should accompany this costume ; but for little boys we know of nothing more distinguished than white cock's feathers held in their place by a puff of blue velvet. More taste than usual is displayed this year in the making of children's clothes, and girls are not now over-dressed and made to look like minature women. Mears D'Antsrs,
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