THE 'SEASON: 1923.
" pLUS ca change, plus c'est in m.!..me chose" may well—outwardly at least—prove the epitaph of the Season of 1923, already hastening to its close. There is a tide in the affairs of fashion, as well as of men. In England the climax of our discomforts was probably reached in 1921, which witnessed the coal strike, the Bolshevist menace, and the " outing " of chaperons. In this year of grace: ordeis to the coal merchant are no longer posted with flutterings of heart. Crowds no longer assemble nightly outside the Polish Legation to bully the representatives of that much harried nation. The chaperons' bench is now so well filled that woe betide the matron, who has tried to sandwich a play or a "grown-up" dinner into her evening. If, regardless of her charges' injunction to arrive "on the tick" of ten, she delays until eleven, she will have a weary bout of standing before she can obtain possession of a seat. Save, indeed, for the fact that diamond bandeaux have generally replaced diamond tiaras, there is small difference at first sight to note between the occupants of the bench in 1914 and 1928. When, however, they leave their coigns of vantage differences aremorenoticeable. If the War revealed young womanhood to herself, mothers and grandmothers also, when subjected to that test, first realized their. potentialities, physical and mental. There was practically no age limit for the ladies who served in canteens or slaved in hospitals. There seems no age limit now for stepping the fox-trot.
We have been told that we do not change our souls with our skies. But the saying does not hold good when it comes to clothes. The modern version of the Greek tunic is as popular with the middle-aged as with the abutante : and once encased in these glorified night- gowns, the bounding spirit of that youthfulness for which they were primarily designed seems to be transferred to their wearers. Perhaps the epithet bounding is inappro- priate. That form of dance became extinct with the polka —so beloved in the ballroom of the 'eighties. Dancing at its best now means gliding, at its worst, paddling. Naturally, the woman who has a half-century behind her can more easily paddle or glide than race in the waltz, or tear madly in the polka of her earlier years. The pace is not forced. It is only the strident iteration of the jazz-band that conveys the sense of hurry. "Whirl- ing," which alone recalls the rapturous thrill of the Blue Hungarian waltzes of old-fashioned days, is pru- dently avoided by matrons. "II n'y a plus de vieilles dames, et pourt,ant une vieille dame c'est si respectable," was the comment of a silver-haired Frenchman who remembered the "last enchantments" of the old great ladies who had received the confidences of his youth. And it is not necessary to remind a Spectator audience that the word respectable, which in England shares the disrepute attached to "Early Victorian," across the Channel, stands for a quality which does not exclude charm.
Chaperons—even fox-trotting in pseudo-classical draperies—are, however, "back numbers." When we reckon up the forces that go to make a "Season," it is the boys and girls who, quite legitimately, are our main objective. Here, again, pre-War conditions seem outwardly to the fore. Seldom has the enclosure at Ascot been more -crowded. The girls' frocks have lengthened, champagne on supper tables excites surprise rather by its absence than its presence, and top hats in the Park, though not as the sand on the seashore, are too many to count.
These same hats probably cover much the same ambi- tions as those of their predecessors—yet with a difference. " Axing " and super-tax combined have dsiven many a young fellow, who would have gravitated to the "Ser- vices," into the City. But, whether at the desk or in the saddle, the ex-public-schoolboy retains his passion for fresh air and athletics. Consequently, when in the broad daylight of summer-time evening lets loose the throng of active youths who have been chained to the office all day, there is a rush for outdoor sport. Ranelagh, with its scarlet liveried attendants waiting at the trim little tables set beneath the trees, makes an attractive setting for tennis or golf, no less than for polo. But, setting or no setting, a little white ball retains its incom- parable lure for healthy young Anglo-Saxons of both sexes ; and tennis, to play or to. watch, is a good second to dancing—as the enthusiasm for Wimbledon proves. Even in Mayfair tennis courts are not unknown. Not ten miles from Becky Sharp's house in Curzon Street it is said that trees—the most precious of rarities in that centre—have been sacrificed to the cult. In fact, the modern millionaire could not earn popularity more certainly than by constructing en tout cas courts in that fashionable area for his young clients.
The Mid-Victorian notes with regret that although polo, the sport of the moneyed minority, has become a national institution, riding for the many is a thing of the past. It is true that the morning throng, wave on wave of riders, in the Row of the 'eighties allowed scant space for the display of horsemanship. But horses well groomed, ridden by smart boys and pretty girls, are at any rate a cheerful spectacle. Riders are still to be seen near the Serpentine, but how few compared even with Edwardian numbers ! Indeed, according to the unwritten modern law that reserves the pleasant things of life for the babes, it is the children mainly who appear to be able to afford "horse exercise."
If the exclamation " Ichabod " springs to the lips of the elderly spectator in the Row, away from that classic spot pessimism as to social events and their actors is surely good worry wasted. The last season before the War, the summer of 1914, was perhaps the most gorgeous on record. But there was a feeling of tense excitement in the atmosphere which might well have heralded the storm. It was not a particularly healthy atmosphere, though it certainly did not sap the latent heroism of out young people. Then came the season of the Armistice, which many elders had cause to regard as even less whole- some. Perhaps it could not be otherwise. Now many of the protagonists have married, and have unmarried, and a new generation has arisen who never tasted the premature emaneipations of war time and grew up under the gravity of a cloud that did not spare nurseries or schoolrooms.
Moreover, the restoration of the chaperon has added to the stability of things;. while, in her turn, the wise chaperon has realized that her mission is to cultivate a sense of responsibility in her charges. The growth of individualism is :Writ large everywhere to-day—reflected in the very costumes of the ballroom. There is no uniform ball gown ; debutantes at Court this year were no longer restricted to virginal white, but could make their first curtsey in any colour they preferred. Indeed, the uninitiated newcomer at a dance might imagine herself at a fancy dress ball where, amidst the welter of shape- less garments, the looped-up draperies of the Second Empire, carefully modelled on -a Winterhalter, jostle an embroidered velvet, in which Beatrice d'Este might have sat to Leonardo, or the swaying panniers of a Georgian belle.
With all this reaction to light-heartedness, there is a distinct gain in the underlying currents of the young world. There are very few male idlers about. In the absence of their swains, the damsels are discovering the merits of their own sex. Girl luncheons are becoming as much a feature of social life in London as in New York, and the sense of solidarity these little festivities impart goes far to exorcise that curse of female intercourse, " Cattishness." Our young people are very cheerful. But it is the healthy gladness of school children let loose to play, making the best of every second of recreation before the bell summons them to work ; that work without which the Twentieth Century Jill, no less than her very good comrade, Jack, realizes that life would be
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