FIRST FIGURE.-Black velvet dress, in the Princess style, richly decorated with fancy silk trimmings. Lace collar and under sleeves. Bonnet of pink crape and black velvet, ornamented with roses. Inside a bandeau of black blond and a large rose on the right.

SECOND FIGURE.

Dress of deep-blue French moire; body high with a waistband. Sleeves, with turned back cuffs, open at the side. On the skirt and cuffs are insertions of black guipure enclosed between very narrow plaitings of blue ribbon. Tulle collar and under-sleeves, black lace cravat, jaconet underskirt, with a wide hem and a deep border of small plaits. Cashmere cloak. Bonnet with a white tulle crown, quadrilled with maroon velvet. Front and curtain maroon velvet. On the front

a maroon feather. Inside blue velvet flowers; velvet strings.

THIRD FIGURE.-Toilet for a little girl six years of age. A striped silk frock. Pardessus of a woollen material, trimmed with bands of

velvet.

Nansook collar and under-sleeves. Tudor hat of black velvet, decorated with a groseille feather. The hair is gathered in a Greek net of groseille chenille.

In home toilet, and at friendly evening parties, this style of head-dress continues in favour For dinner parties, two coiffures in hair merit distinction. The one for a young lady of thirty is a Greek coiffure, style Ariane, with a loose curl falling on the neck, and a pouff of black velvet. The other is adapted for a girl of eighteen, and is also a coiffure Greek, but of the Hebe genre, with curls and ringlets frisées flowing on the neck.

Flowers powdered with aluminium are very much worn, both in bonnets and head dresses. Simple robes are garnished with a plaited trimming: it may be of silk, in striking contrast with the colour of the dress, or of the same material. The plaits are often five, six, and eight inches in height: they are sometimes made with a double heading, bordered with

silk.

All self-coloured robes are bordered with black velvet.

I have seen some very pretty specimens of evening dress, which may be useful as models. One, a toilet of white muslin, for a young lady, has a succession of narrow flounces placed on bias as high as the knee, and surmounted by a traversed by a mauve transparent. Corsage rather deep flounce, headed with a bouillonné low, with fichu La Vallière, garnished with ruches. Sleeves bouffantes, demi-long, and liberally pointed. Another robe, of blue muslin is precisely the reverse of the preceding one in its decoration. A deep flounce is set on at the bottom, and is finished with a heading, above which six other narrow flounces are placed. Low body. Fichu rounded behind, with ends crossing on the bosom, of the same material as the dress. Sleeves full, open, and pointed.

For demi-toilet take the following: a robe of rayed organdi white and black, trimmed with jittle flounces festooned with lilach, almost as high as the knee. Corsage low, with a high chemisette of plaited muslin, garnished with lilach ribbon; sleeves gathered at the top, large and open at the bottom.

Black and white continues in favour for dress bonnets: one, just composed, is a capote of white tulle, drawn over black silk, with a bavolet of black silk, and a great puff, and ends of black ribbon, sustaining a bou

quet of Solferino roses, with foliage of black velvet.

The toilets announced for winter are very rich, but very simple; and the same rule will apply to bonnets.

There have been some novelties produced during the past month in the dramatic way. Of these, the chief is at

THE PRINCESS's,

Where "Othello" has been produced, Mr. Fechter enacting the mighty Moor. We shall in our next give a detailed criticism of his performance, and will merely say now, that the reading is a brilliant but unequal one, nothing particularly fine occurring till the third act, where the genius of this original actor shows itself. His chief defects are too much colloquial familiarity in the delivery of the text, and his foreign accent. But beauties and blemishes are scattered throughout his impersonation, which we will more fully enter into hereafter. At

THE ADELPHI

Nothing new has been produced.

THE HAYMARKET

Has been varying its tone by presenting tragedy, Mr. E. Booth having been performing Shylock and Sir Giles Overreach. He has met with much applause, his elocution and stage business being very good, superadded to his correct and vivid readings of his parts. Of him we shall speak in detail in our next.

THE ST. JAMES'S

Has re-opened under Mr. Wigan's rule, with the adapted Comedy, "A Scrap of Paper," and is well filled. THE OLYMPIC

Has put forth a new play, unlike its usual stamp, in consequence of the illness of Mr. Robson, who has now, however, we are glad to hear, nearly recovered. At

THE LYCEUM,

The Comedy "Woman" has been still running, with good audiences, and we accept the stability of a piece as a proof of its popularity.

THE STRAND

Has brought out another burlesque of Mr. Byron's " Esmeralda," perhaps the best in dramatic construction of his pieces of this class. The usual play upon words and parodies, dances and dresses abound in it.

DRURY LANE

Opened on the 28th with great promise of representations of Shakespeare, sustained by Mr. Brooke. Here we must conclude, but next month shall present our readers with a more elaborate criticism on the various entertainments. W. R.

Whatever tends to foster habits of foresight | and economy in a people, tends also to the growth of self-reliance and the self-respect which is its fruit, and is an advance step in their civilization; just as the trusting to extraneous help (prospective or actual), friends, the "Charitable Bequests Board," or any other form of unearned pecuniary assistance, moulders a man's heart at the core, and takes out of him the moral pith and back-bone, in the strength of which alone he walks upright, and feels the healthful vigour of independence. Mind, I speak of "trusting" to extraneous help; for there are times when the friendly grip of another can alone save us from the quicksands of some

sudden calamity or turn of fortune, and we should sink but for outside assistance. The conditions are wholly different, and everyone can point their separate examples.

The man who is content to accept gratuities for earnings, accepts a down-at-heel condition for life. He may have "greatness thrust upon him," but he never achieves it: he may inherit a fortune, but he never wins one. If his position shuts him out from such probabilities, he sneaks his way through the world, with just provision from day to day, content to have his short-comings to his family made up to them by anyone who will relieve him of his responsibilities; and is, to all appearance, as senseless

as a browzing sheep to any need of foresight for the future. Such a state of things is by no means uncommon amongst our industrial classes —even to men in full health and occupation. An almost total want of ordinary prudence and frugality characterizes them as a body, when employed, and as total an abnegation of selfdependence as soon as a mill stops, or a blastfurnace is quenched. Any step, therefore, that helps a man to a sense of higher social duties than is involved in the mere earning of daily-bread-that promises, with the help of a little self-denial, to set him beyond the need of charity in sickness or old age, is one to be rejoiced at; and, as such, we congratulate the public upon the accomplished fact of Post-office Saving Banks.

A penetrating mind may discern something more in their establishment than a paternal Government's desire to encourage thrift and foresight in the working-classes; and, remember, that the man who holds Government-securities for his savings, gives the best security to Government for his loyalty and love of order. Men who have saving-bank books to fill, will neither be anxious for strikes nor any other form of public rupture, and in this view of the case the whole nation is the gainer.

"But," it may be said, "savings.banks have existed for years, and the advantage in the shape of interest to the depositor is not greater than under the old system."

There were, however, under the old system, such things as occasional robberies, a dishonest secretary, or defalcations on a greater scale; and a savings bank has occasionally collapsed, bringing ruin to hard-working or aged men and women, who had no hope beyond that little hoard and the gloomy portals of the workhouse. In the post-office saving-banks, however, the money is as secure as the Government; while

the investing and withdrawing of it are simplified to a degree previously unimagined.

Under the old system, a deposit could only be made at certain hours, on certain days of the week-a book had to be purchased, and, the deposit being made, could not, under any circumstances, be withdrawn short of a fortnight's notice; while the depositor had frequently a long distance to walk, to pay in or draw out his money. All this is now obviated.

On the first day these banks opened, I found the post-mistress of the district in which I am living quite radiant with pleasure at having had thirteen depositors in the course of the forenoon.

"You see, ma'am, the men must pass the post-office somewhere or another in their way to and from work, and as they are at liberty to make the deposit at any one of them, and at any hour from nine o'clock till six, and may put in as little as a shilling if they please, and have nothing to pay for the book, you can understand it is a great temptation to a man to make a beginning-and I do hope"

"And so do I, Mrs. Post-mistress-that, the beginning once made, may lead from shilling deposits to pounds; and that the system of postoffice saving-banks, scattered throughout the length and breadth of the kingdom, may help to produce those habits of frugality and carefulness, of which, in the aggregate, the workingclasses are so negligent."

A little pamphlet, published by Emily Faithful and Co., at the Victoria Press (for the employment of women), in Great Coram-street, and sold at 5s. per hundred, will put our readers in possession of the whole system, and enable them to spread a knowledge of it amongst their workpeople and all with whom they have any influence. C. A. W.

a little longer. The first chapter received. “A "Posthumous Letter" in our next.

M. S. H., Newbury, Berks. — Whatever papers this correspondent may send us shall meet with attention, and, if suitable, acceptance; if otherwise, they shall be returned on receipt of postage-stamps for the purpose. We really must be excused prescribing the style of our correspondents' writings, though we shall be glad to judge of her own; short papers, whatever be their nature, are best adapted to our pages. We are not in want of a continuous tale.

PROSE received, but not yet read: "Miss Caw;" "How I won my Victoria Cross ;" "A Memory of our Darling Alice;" Seymour versus Maitland."

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