Of course, the Greek lady never supposed she had a waist. She often, for the sake of convenience, tied a string round her body, but only just tightly enough to keep her clothes in place, and then nearly always let some folds of the drapery fall over and hide the unsightly line (Fig. 1). If there must be a waist, I distinctly prefer the one placed under the armpits, in the fashion of the beginning of this century, for it is physically impossible to tie it so tightly as to much alter the form, and having the division high up tends to minimise the most common defect of the English female figure, a want of length in the leg (Fig. 2).
Of course, it is this very want of length that has led to the high heels, but the remedy is worse than the disease. It does not really give the impression of long-leggedness, and it does alter and spoil the whole carriage of the body.
The high heels also help to deform the feet by pressing the toes forward into the pointed ends of those terrible boots that are another disgrace to our civilisation. Painters and sculptors have good cause to know that the modern female foot is a hideous object—our vitiated taste has become accustomed to it when clothed, but when seen in its naked deformity it is a thing to shudder at.
It occurs to me that there are two fundamental rules of dress.
First, wherever the dress is tight it should show the true natural form of the body beneath, and should not suggest, and still less produce, some entirely unnatural and artificial form. (This rule, of course, only applies to tolerably good figures.)
Secondly, where the dress is loose it should be allowed to fall in its own natural folds, and should not be gathered up into the horrible convolutions miscalled drapery by the milliners.
The old Greek dress fulfilled these conditions in the highest degree, and, I have no doubt, was the noblest form of clothing ever invented. All other forms of dress have abounded in monstrosities of one kind or another, but in looking over the history of costume one now and then comes across some simple and artistic form which seems to have sprung up by chance, as it were, or as a transition between two opposite exaggerations. Here is a fine example from the early middle ages (Fig. 3). And here, again, is a good design from a much later period (Fig. 4).
