Victorian Fashion ~ May 1852

Figures 1 and 2.—Ball and Visiting Toilet.

May is here with its bursting buds and early flowers, but its fickleness overmatches that of its imitator, Fashion, and foils all her attempts at adaptation of costume for the carriage or the promenade. To-day the sun smiles as in leafy June; to-morrow cold, gray clouds lower upon the brow of the firmament, and chilling winds chase the zephyrs back to the orange groves of the South. To-day a light dress is seasonable; to-morrow a cloak might not be uncomfortable. 

Fig. 3.—Visiting Dress.

Fig. 4.—Ball Toilet.

~ Excerpts from Harper's New Monthly Magazine, May 1852