Observe the extra fatigue which is insured to every woman in merely
carrying a tray upstairs, from the skirts of the dress. Ask any young
women who are studying to pass examinations whether they do not find
loose clothes a _sine qua non_ while poring over their books, and then
realize the harm we are doing ourselves and the race by habitually
lowering our powers of life and energy in such a manner. As a matter
of fact it is doubtful whether any persons have ever been found
who would say that their stays were at all tight; and, indeed, by a
muscular contraction they can apparently prove that they are not so by
moving them about on themselves, and thus probably believe what
they say. That they are in error all the same they can easily assure
themselves by first measuring round the waist outside the stays; then
take them off, let them measure while they take a deep breath, with
the tape merely laid on the body as if measuring for the quantity of
braid to go round a dress, and mark the result. The injury done by
stays is so entirely internal that it is not strange that the maladies
caused by wearing them should be attributed to every reason under
the sun except the true one, which is, briefly, that all the internal
organs, being by them displaced, are doing their work imperfectly and
under the least advantageous conditions: and are, therefore, exactly
in the state most favorable to the development of disease, whether
hereditary or otherwise.--_Macmillan's Magazine._