The first is a _corset_ or _stay_ of dimity, or jean, or silk, reaching from the shoulders down to the waist, and over the hips, to the complete envelopement of the body. It is rendered of more than ordinary power by elastic bones, &c. which, introduced between the lining and covering of the _stay_, bring it into something of the consistency and shape of an ancient warrior’s hauberk. This new-fashioned coat of mail for the fair sex is so constructed, as to compress and reduce to the shape desired the natural prominence of the female figure in a state of fruitfulness. Some women, who are bold enough to wear this Procrustean garb during every stage of their pregnancy, affirm that it preserves their shape without injury to their state of increase. However this may be with a few hardy individuals, I profess myself no proselyte to the innovation, as it must necessarily put a degree of restraint upon the operations of nature, very likely to produce bad effects both on the mother and the child. Support and confinement to an overstrained part are two different things; the one is beneficial, the other destructive. And this I can assure my readers, that I ever have remarked those married women who have longest maintained their virgin forms were those who, in a state of maternal increase, observed a proper medium between a too relaxed and a too contracted boddice. Nature in these concerns is our best guide; and when she dictates to us to provide against the possible disagreeable consequences of any of her operations, it is well to obey her; but when a fastidious, and, allow me to say, an indelicate, regard to personal charms would excite you to brace with ribs of whalebone the soft mould of your unborn infant; or when it has, in spite of these arts, burst its prison-house alive, you seek to deprive it of the nourishment your breast prepares--then remember you perform not the duty of a mother, but show yourself rather egregiously guilty of wantonness and unpardonable cruelty. No person living can feel a more lively admiration than that which animates me at the sight of a beautiful form, --“rife With all we can imagine of the sky.” I behold in it the work of the most perfect being--the accomplishment of one of his fairest designs. He seems to show in earthy mould the lovely transcript of the angels of heaven: she looks, she breathes, of innocence and sweet unconscious beauty. But when I cast my eyes on women issuing from the house of a modern manufacturer of shapes; when I see the functions of nature impeded by bands and ligatures; when I behold the abode of virgin modesty thrust forward to the gaze of the libertine; when I observe the pains taken to attract his eye,--I turn away disgusted, and blush for my sex.