"During the cold and damp months they should be made of thick, solid
leather. No matter about the name; some calfskin is very thin, while
morocco is often very thick. During the warm season they may wear
for uppers prunella, or other cloth."
This much was spoken to my girls. I might leave the shape and width
of the heel to the intelligence of the reader; but as the most
preposterous heels have been recently introduced, it is perhaps
judicious to point out the physiological mischief. The heels of the
fashionable ladies' shoes at the present moment--quarter past
three, P.M., August 4th, 1870,--are two inches high, and at the
bottom not larger than an old-fashioned silver quarter of a dollar,
if anybody can remember how large that was.
Need it be argued that this absurd fashion weakens the ankle, and
jams the toes into the sharp points of the boots?
If a woman were to walk as much as her health requires, with those
most unphysiological heels, her feet would soon be crippled. The
ankle, the heel, the arch of the foot and the toes must all suffer.
It need hardly be said that heels should be broad, long and low. The
great advantage in elasticity and firmness which would come at once
in the manner of walking, would, even as to stylishness, more than
compensate for the absence of the fashionable Shanghai heels.