Small Waists [pp. 73-75]

74 S1JiL4LL WAISTS. [Juix 18,
About the middle of the tenth century
there came up a terrible and cruel corset,
called cottes hardies. These were stiffened
with steel, and clasped with brass or gold.
We know very well, from the pictures of that
period, what intensely small waists were produced, and what stiffness of figure. The
French words corps and serres (to tighten),
which seem to have suggested the word corset, could not have better expressed this article of dress. We do not know how many
women died of these corsets —probably more
than have ever died of a broken heart. Men
as well as women wore the horrible things.
One lady of rank is described as wearing "a
splendid gidle of beaten gold about her
middle small." Chaucer describes one of his
beauties as being "small as a weasel, and
upright as a bolt," which does not suggest a
very pleasing image of female loveliness to
the modern mind.
But, if it was one thing to lace in the
waists, it was another to augment the size
of the skirt until its outrageous circumference should make any waist look small. This
idea undoubtedly arose when the rich silks
of tihe middle ages, stiffened with gold and
silk brocade, came to be plaited into a skirt
for a slender figure. The great mass stood
out of itself, and made the waist look very
slender. It was a fabric unknown to the Romans and Greeks, vwho had mostly a soft
woolen cloth out of which to construct their
dresses, and it made a fashion for itself. We
find those handsome creatures, the Italian
women of the fifteenth century, outdoing all
others in this luxury of the robe. Queen
Catherine de Medici stands in one of the galleries at Florence in stately splendor, with a
hoop of enormous dimensions holding out her
splendid brocade. In fact, the heavy skirt
at once suggested the hoop, and necessitated
it, for it was so heavy as to fatigue the wearer; and the hoop is always a great relief.
It would be a curious study in itself to
note the edicts which have been passed by
various monarchs in regard to the excessive
fashions of various periods. Charles V. of
France issued one against long trains. Albert
of Saxony issued several: as that "no wives
or daughters of knights should wear spangles
in their caps or high frills about their throats;
also one against preposterously long shoes.
Louis XI. took down the high, sugar-loaf
head-dresses; and Maximilian I. of Germany
issued many other sumptuary laws and repressive edicts.
It was reserved for the Emperor Joseph II.
of Austria (who did not foresee that his royal
successor, the present empress, would have
a waist of sixteen inches) to issue an edict
against the corset. Undoubtedly tight lacing
had become a very serious matter, and the
health of the people was suffering. He threatened all damsels with excommunication if
they persisted in wearing the corset. Physicians, popes, and bishops, declaimed against
it, and nunneries and other places where
young women were educated, were put under
the surveillance of the police of the period,
until every woman was forced —absolutely
forced-to lace tighter than ever, and put her
wits to work to baffle king, kaiser, emperor,
pope, and bishop. No doubt, however, that
this crusade did some good. It may have
released some poor girl from her corset prison who was dying of spine-disease or heartdisease, but, like all crusades of the kind
against the personal liberty of the subject, it
was not conducive of lasting good.
Old Catherine de Medici, howvever, invented a corset warranted to reduce the waist
to thirteen inches, which may fairly be appended as a characteristic cruelty to the history of the authoress of St. Bartholomew's
Day. This was a steel plate, with holes cut
in it to give it lightness, closed with immovable hasps. This was almost a suit of armor,
and made the wearer look "as if imprisoned
in a closely-fitting fortress." Over this terrible invention the silk basque or jacket fitted
without a wrinkle. Catherine could forgive
a great deal to the ladies of her court, but
she could not forgive them a thick waist or
an ill-fitting dress. She laced her daughters
and her sons, this horrible old Catherine, until they said of her sons that they were like
their mother in slenderness of figure, " only
lacking her will and understanding."
Elizabeth of England was not slow to follow the fashions of her royal sister. Who
does not remember royal Bess, stiff as a
poker, in her "ruff and fardingale?" The
pictures which she carefully caused to be
painted of herself, each and every one made
her look uglier than the last. What a tribute it is to the feminine tact and taste of
Mary Queen of Scots that she, educated at
the court of Catherine de Medici, and living
near that of Elizabeth, so modified and ameliorated the excesses of the times that she
presents, at this moment, the most beautiful
study of female costume that the world has
ever seen!
Not so her son, King Jamie, as the Scots
called him. He wore corsets, and had them
laced preposterously. His nether garments
were stuffed with wool and hair, to make his
waist look smaller. In fact, in the Harleian
Manuscripts we learn that a scaffold had to
be erected around the Houses of Parliament
for the convenience of those members who
had their hose so stuffed that they could neither bend nor sit down! The doublet as well,
owing to James's miserable cowardice, was
so hard-quilted as to resemble a coat-of-mail.
Imagine a "belted earl" in such a prison
as this!
Henry IV. of France is said to have invented hair-powder, to conceal his grayness;
and his second wife, Mary de Medici, growing
stout, brought in short waists, and no hoops.
But this fashion did not last long. The passion for the long, small waist was too deeply
seated in human nature, and in the days of
Louis XIV. we have it to perfection.
No mutations of fashion can make those
exquisite costumes of the courts of Louis
XIV. and XV. look otherwise than beautiful.
The lady of Louis XIV.'s time was a perfectly well-dressed woman; every natural charm
was heightened by a judicious and elegant
luxury; the figure was not distorted, although
it was held in shape. The small sleeve, finishing with a iall of lace at the elbow, has
never been improved upon, and the whole
costume for men and for women was stately,
graceful, and becoming.
During the disgraceful reign of Charles II.,
the dress of women somewhat resembled their
morals. It is difficult to imagine a style of
hair-dressing, for instance, which was more
injurious to the expression of the face. Such
a thing as a pure, open brow was not to be
seen in the three kingdoms; little, fantastic curls were combed down on the forehead,
giving almost every face a bad expression.
Corsets went out, as a rule, during this reign
-probably the Duchess of Portsmouth did
not approve of them; and the dresses were
loose and slouchy. Look at some of the
pictures of the period! Not so with the prim
Puritans. In fact, "strait-laced" has been
a synonym for Puritan morality ever since.
Stiff, prim, and formal, tight-laced, and
sour-faced, were the young ladies of Cromwell's time. It was the natural swing of the
pendulum. "Here we go, and there we go,"
through all the ages' Chains, coronets, pendants, bracelets, and ear rings,
Pins, girdles, spangles, embroideries, and rings,
Shadomes, rebatacs, ribbands, ruffs, cuffs, falls,
Scarfs, feathers, fans, maskes, muffes, laces,
caulsk
all went out, and a plain bib and tucker came
in, but the vanity of the small waist and the
high-heeled shoe remained.
Those delicious shepherdesses of Watteau
(shepherdesses who owned no sheep, unless
their lovers) had very small waists. Look
on the Dresden china, and the fans. In fact,
the corset must have been well-fitting in the
days of Louis XV., for it made the figure
beautiful, and did not distort the face.
- In the days of the Spectator in England,
say about 1713, the crinoline had reached its
most outrageous dimensions. It lifted the
dress on either side the hips, showing the foot
and ankle. The corset was worn extremely
tight. The wits of the period found ample
food for their pasquinades and jokes, but it
is an astonishing fact in the history of fashion that no amount of ridicule has ever affected a particular style of dress.
Who makes fashion? and why does it
last? Why does it change? Caricature and
contempt fall upon it like sunbeams on a
stone-wall, when lo! we wake in the morning,
and learn that some hidden edict has gone
forth, and the fashion is changed! no one
knows how or wherefore.
Hogarth's pictures, drawn about 1730,
give us the long, straight, slender- waisted
corset, as used in England. Alas! poor
Marie Antoinette, too —we know how small
was her waist, how enormous her hoops.
Madame Tussaud has a set of hoops, said to
be those of the unfortunate Aestrian Marie
Antoinette. It is a basket-work, and looks
as if meant for vines to grow on. It is no
wonder that the pendulum swung so much
the other way in Napoleon's day, and that
the French nation became inordinately classic!
Short-waisted, corsetless, and classic, are
the dresses of the empire; the fashions were
very ugly, and not permanent. They bore
the complexion of the time. For about ten
years, at this period of the world's history,
corsets were unknown. The results, according
to many physicians, were disastrous, spinal
I
I
74
SMA-L-L WAISTS.
[JUILY 18,