Rage For Miniatures

Too many of our oíd time fashions are going out, but one at least is coming in again. I speak of the wearing of miniatures, says the Woman at Home. There is, indeed, quite a rage for these delicate little portraits just now of our fairest women and children. You may have them n any size you may choose; wear them as lockets or in buttons, waistbauds or shoebuckles. They are charming, too, inserted as a medallion on the cover of au ivory or tortoise-shell notebook, card case or pet volume of any kind. And I imagine a miniature would become the top of a lovely scent bottle upon one's toilet table. Only the othe'r day I heard of au American millionaire who gave orders to a fashionable miniature painter to emblazon nis watch case with flowers of rare enamel round the cherub heads of his two tiny daughters. For my part, I ■would like on opening the watch to see the inside of the case disclose the smiling face of one near and dear to me. 'Tis such a pretty, dainty art, that of miniature painting! "It needed but that we should wait" for the revival of so attractive a vogue. Our great and great-great-grandmothers chose to wear the miniatures of their beloved ones in thin gold medaillons, suspended by a black-watered ribbon round their necks and fastened with a gold pin or brooch over the left breast. I doubt not we shall be doing likewise in the year of grace 1897. Great ladies, and ladies who like to follow their betters, are giving orders right and left to miniature painters. The best ground for the work is, of course, ivory, which is practically indestructible. But, although we have scme clever and careful artists, the brilliant and charming work of others of a bygone day is by no means equaled.