course, adapt their productions to its necessities. Hence, however elegantly shaped or finely stitched they might be, they utterly failed in the object which they should have served. In this case the body was forced into the shape of the corset, instead of the corset being fitted to the shape of the body; there was, consequently, an infringement of the laws of Nature, and we all know that no one can violate her canon with impunity.
The true object of corsets ought to be to support the bones as they increase in size and weight, without obstructing the due development of the muscles by which they are moved. The artist in corsets will therefore anticipate every requirement through life, and adapt her contrivances to the ever varying wants of the body.
Against tight lacing, we, in common with all who have paid attention to the subject, earnestly protest. By a perseverance in this habit, the health is injured and the symmetry of the figure entirely destroyed. The stays in ordinary use are ill-constructed, and cannot be effectual in the promotion of the objects for which they are professedly designed, whether tightly laced or not. Let us suppose a young lady who has been in the habit of stooping, suddenly made aware of the injury to her general health occasioned by this practice, going to one of the numerous staymakers with which London abounds, in hopes that she may be able to purchase what will restore her to the erect position. Most of our readers are aware that this will be attempted by a strong steel, whalebone, or wooden busk passed down the front of the corset; that the stays will be strengthened by an immense number of springs and bones, placed without the least regard to the anatomical construction of the body; and that, moreover, in order to give the necessary power of motion to the figure, pieces of elastic are fitted in at the back. Now, by this arrangement, the lady who subjects herself to this machine may for a few days be kept erect by the pressure of the busk. As for grace or comfort, that is totally out of the question, as the busk presses too much upon the chest and abdomen to permit ease to be for one moment a matter of consideration, and in the course of a very short time the busk becomes the whole medium of support; it bends under the weight, and by its inward curvature presses on the very portion of the body whose free action is essential to health. In this case the stays only aggravate the evil; for, if she must stoop, it is better that she
