The corset and the crinoline

by William Barry Lord

"I do not for a moment deny the truth of your artist correspondent's assertions, for I consider, as every one must, that the proportions of the human body are the most beautiful in creation (where all is beautiful and correct), but the great mistake which so many make is this. In civilised countries the body is always clothed; and that clothing, especially of the ladies of European nations, completely hides the contour of the body. The effect of this is to give great clumsiness to the waist when that part of the person is of its natural size. Let any one make a fair and unprejudiced trial, such as this: let him get a statuette of some celebrated antique, the Venus de Medici or the Greek Slave, and have it dressed in an ordinary dress of the present day, and see what the effect really is. Until fashion, in its ever-changing round, returns to the costume of Ancient Greece or Rome, we can never expect to persuade ladies not to compress their waists merely on the score of beauty; and as several of your correspondents have shown that a moderate compression is not so injurious as some supposed, there is no chance of the corset becoming an obsolete article of female dress. It has been in use for seven or eight hundred years, and now that its form and construction are so much modified and improved, there need be no longer an outcry against it; indeed, outcry has for centuries failed to affect it, though other articles of dress have become in their turn obsolete, a clear proof that there is something more than mere arbitrary fashion in its hold upon the fair sex."

Another gentleman, not an artist, but whose sisters now suffer from all the annoyances consequent on clumsy, ill-trained figures, thus writes to the Englishwoman's Domestic Magazine of September, 1867:—

"Though the subject on which I propose to address to you a few observations hardly concerns a man, I hope you will allow me a little space in your excellent journal to express my views upon it. I have been much interested by reading the correspondence on the subject of slender waists, and the means used for attaining them. Now, there can be no doubt that gentlemen admire those figures the most which have attained the greatest slenderness. I think there is no more deplorable sight than a large and clumsy waist; and as nature, without assistance from art, seldom produces a really small waist, I think those mothers and schoolmistresses who insist upon their daughters or pupils between the ages of ten and seventeen wearing well-made corsets, and having them tightly laced, confer upon the young ladies a great benefit, which, though they may not appreciate at the time, they will when they go out into society. Certainly some of your correspondents seem to have fallen into the hands of schoolmistresses thoroughly aware of the advantages of a good figure—a waist that two hands can easily clasp is certainly a marvel. I never had the good fortune to see such a one, yet one of your correspondents assures us that her daughter's was no larger than that. Nora, too, says that her waist only measured thirteen inches when she left school; this seems to me to be miraculously small. Most gentlemen do not think much about the means used for attaining a fashionable figure, and I should not have done so either if I had not heard it a good deal discussed in my family, where my sisters were never allowed to lace at all tightly, the consequence of which is, that now that they are grown up they have very clumsy figures, much to their regret; but it is too late to alter them now. As doctors seem to think that the dangers of tight-lacing have been much exaggerated, and as I know many ladies with very slender waists enjoying quite as good health as their more strongly built sisters, I would urge upon all who wish to have good figures not to be deterred by alarmists from endeavouring gradually to attain an elegant shape."

It is most remarkable that, notwithstanding the number of letters which have been published casting condemnation and ridicule on those who wear corsets, not one can we discover containing the personal experiences of those who have been anything but temporary sufferers from even their extreme use, whilst such letters as the following, which appeared in the Englishwoman's Domestic Magazine of August, 1867, are of a nature to lead to the conclusion that unless the germs of disease of some kind are rooted in the system, a well-made and perfectly-fitting corset may be worn with impunity, even when habitually laced with considerable tightness. The lady thus gives her own experiences and those of her daughters:—

"From the absence of any correspondence on the all-important topic of tight-lacing in your August number, I very much fear that the subject has come to an end. If so, many other subscribers besides myself will be very sorry for it. I cannot tell you what pleasure it gave me to see the sentiments that were expressed by so many who, like myself, are addicted to the practice of tight-lacing, and as for many years I have been in the habit of lacing extremely tight, I trust that you will allow me, by inserting this or part of it, to make known that I have never suffered any pain or illness from it. In the days when I was a schoolgirl, stays were worn much stiffer and higher than the flimsy things now used, and were, besides, provided with shoulder-straps, so that to be very tightly incased in them was a much more serious affair than at the present day.[3] But, nevertheless, I remember our governess would insist on the greatest possible amount of constriction being used, and always twice a day our stays were tightened still more. A great amount of exercise was inculcated, which perhaps did away with any ill effects this extreme tight-lacing might have occasioned, but while at school I imbibed a liking for the practice, and have ever since insisted on my maid lacing me as tightly as she possibly can. I quite agree with Staylace in saying that to be tightly laced in a pair of tight-fitting stays is a most superb sensation. My two daughters, aged respectively sixteen and eighteen, are brought up in the same way, and would not consider themselves properly dressed unless their stays were drawn together. They can bear me out in my favourable opinion of tight-lacing, and their good health speaks volumes in its praise. I hope, madam, you will kindly insert this letter in your valuable and largely-circulated magazine."

[3] Fairholt remarks, in speaking of the discipline observed in schools during the reign of George III.—"It was the fashion to educate girls in stiffness of manner at all public schools, and particularly to cultivate a fall of the shoulders and an upright set of the bust. The top of the steel stay busk had a long stocking-needle attached to it to prevent girls from spoiling their shape by stooping too much over their needlework. This I have heard from a lady since dead who had often felt these gentle hints and lamented their disuse."

Many opponents to the use of the corset have strongly urged the somewhat weak argument, that ladies with slender waists are not generally admired by the gentlemen. That question has been ably dealt with in one or two of the preceding letters from ladies, and it is but fair to them that the opinions of both the young and old of the male sex (candidly communicated to the columns of the Englishwoman's Domestic Magazine) should be added to the weight of evidence in favour of almost universal admiration for a slender and well-rounded waist. Thus writes a young baronet in the number for October, 1867:—

"As you have given your readers the benefit of Another Correspondent's excellent letter will you kindly allow another member of the sterner sex to give his opinion on the subject of small waists? Those who have endeavoured to abolish this most becoming fashion have not hesitated to declare that gentlemen do not care for a slender figure, but that, on the contrary, their only feeling on beholding a waist of eighteen inches is one of pity and contempt. Now so far from this being the case, there is not one gentleman in a thousand who is not charmed with the sight. Elderly gentlemen, no doubt, may be found who look upon such things as 'vanity and vexation of spirit;' but is it for these that young ladies usually cultivate their charms? There is one suggestion I should be glad to make if you will permit me, and that is that all those ladies who possess that most elegant attraction, a slender waist, should not hide it so completely by shawls or loose paletots when on the promenade or in the street. When by good-luck I chance to meet a lady who has the good taste, I may say the kindness, to show her tapering waist by wearing a close-fitting paletot, I not unfrequently turn to admire, and so far from thinking of the means used to obtain the result, I am held spellbound by the beauty of the figure."

That elderly gentlemen are by no means as indifferent to the attractions of elegant slenderness as our young correspondent supposes, will be best shown by a letter from a family man on the subject, communicated to the above journal, November, 1867. He says—

"I have read with much interest the correspondence on the above subject in the Englishwoman's Conversazione for several months past, having accidentally met with one of the numbers of your magazine in a friend's house, and have since regularly taken it, although not previously a subscriber. As an ardent admirer of small waists in ladies, I wish to record for the satisfaction of those who possess them the fact, which is sometimes disputed, that the pains bestowed in attaining a slender figure are not in vain so far as we gentlemen are concerned, and some of us are positively absurd in our excessive admiration of this particular female beauty. Poets and novelists are perpetually introducing heroines with tiny waists and impossible feet, and if they are to portray female loveliness in all its attributes, they could not well omit two such essential points, and I take it their ideal is not an unfair criterion of the taste of the public at large. I am delighted to learn from very clear evidence put forward by your many correspondents that 'small waists' are attainable by most ladies at little or no inconvenience, and that those of the clumsier build are willing to suffer a certain amount of pain if necessary in reducing their bulky figures to graceful proportions, and, above all, that this can be done without injury to health, for after all it would be a dearly-purchased charm if health were sacrificed. Some fifteen or twenty years ago, I recollect the word 'stays' was uttered as though a certain amount of disgrace attached to the wearer, and 'tight-lacing' was looked on as a crime; but I am glad to see that a reaction is setting in, and that ladies are not afraid to state openly that 'they lace very tightly,' and many of them declare the sensation of being laced as tightly as possible as positively a pleasurable one. I may say that personally I feel that every lady of my acquaintance, or with whom I may come in contact, who does so places me under a direct obligation. I will go further than your correspondent, A Young Baronet, and say that whenever I meet a young lady who possesses the charm of a small waist, and has the good taste to wear the tight-fitting dress now fashionable for the promenade, I make it a point to see her pretty figure more than once, and have often gone considerably out of my way to do so. Although married years and years ago, I am still a slave to a 'little waist,' and I am proud to say my wife humours my whim, and her waist is decidedly a small one. I will, therefore, add my experience to that of others (more competent to give an opinion, having experienced tight-lacing in their own proper persons), and state that she never enjoyed better health than when her waist was the smallest, and I shall be much disappointed if her daughters, when they 'come out' do not emulate their mother's slender figure. By keeping your Conversazione open to the advocates of tight-lacing, and thoroughly ventilating the subject, you will, in my opinion, confer a benefit on the rising generation of young ladies, whose mammas, in too many instances, are so prejudiced against the use of the corset that they permit their daughters to grow up into clumsy, awkward young women, to their own disgust and great detriment in the matrimonial market.

"I am, madam, your obedient servant,

"Benedict."