Posted by The Mysterious H.C. on July 26, 1997 at 08:42:49:
In reply to Book to recommend posted by Mary on July 24, 1997 at 14:30:05
] I just finished reading Regency Etiquette, The Mirror of Graces (1811) by a Lady of Distinction. The ISBN number is 0-914046-24-1. After reading about it on the Austen-L I purchased it for about $20 (US) from R.L. Shep Publications.] Ladies undergarments:
] p. 96, concerning the long stay (or corset): "A vile taste in the contriver, and as stupid an approval by a large majority of women, have brought this monstrous distortiion into a kind of fashion; and in consequence we see in eight women out of ten...the bosom shoved up to the chin, making a sort of fleshy shelf, disgusting to the beholders, and certainly most incommodious to the bearer."
"I learnt from Mrs. Tickars's young lady, to my high amusement, that the stays now are not made to force the bosom up at all; that was a very unbecoming, unnatural fashion."
- -- letter of September 15 1813
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