placement of vital and assimilative viscera that follows the amount of pressure, the metal support in front has an injurious effect which has been universally overlooked. However well it may be protected from contact with the surface, it acts as a conductor of animal warmth and of the electromotive agency passing through the frame; it carries off by its polarization into the surrounding air, especially during humid states of the atmosphere, the electricity of the body, this agent being necessary to the due discharge of the nervous functions either in its electro-galvanic or magneto-electric state of manifestation. The injurious influence of stays on the female economy, as respects not only diseases of the spinal column but also the disorders of the uterine organs, is manifest to all who consider the subject."—Dr. Copeland's Medical Dictionary, p. 855.
We have selected the above extract from Dr. Copeland, because he is one of the most able, learned, and judicious medical writers of this day, and one, too, whose work will be read for a long time to come, as his "Dictionary of Practical Medicine" is an elaborate digest of the whole circle of medical
