The age-herald., 1901-01-13

man was the worst enemy of the reform of corset wearing and tight facing, and am right. What woman would not put herself to untold torture in order to reduce her waist. rather than hear some man whose good opinion she craved say:
 ."You look like feather bed tied In the middle!' =,
 And what man, walking the streets, Will not make disparaging comparisons between the we'll corst,.ed woman and her sister who goes in for comfort rather than TOT looks? So many women do the latter.
 In all this controversy the young girl her self has not been consulted. It is true, If you gave her a choice, after she had donned a corset for the first time she would tell you that '.she never, never could wear corset" But after she has become ac- customed to one she would say: Il never could do without a corset. l do not see how women go without them."
 This same growing girl may not thank us if in a few years time Dame Fashion, that tyrannical lady, decrees that "an eigh- teen inch waist and no diaphragm shall be the thing
 The present craze for outdoor sports, and the absolute necessity of wearing no cor sets, or else corsets very loosely laced, in order to obtain free play for the body, has, perhaps, paved the way for the abolition of corsetS of any Kind or description TOT young girls
 The crusade is on in Paris. Physicians in the French capital are studying the question in all it's phases, and are experi- menting on "health waists" which will give the support many eminent men and women of the profession claim Is absolute ly necessary for the adolescent woman. One doctor has cast all preconceived ideas to the winds by declaring that supporting the weight of the clothes from the shoul- ders is harmful instead of helpful.
 He claims that it throws this terribly i'm portant diaphragm out of gear. According to the new order of thigs, this organ of the human body is of the most paramount importance. Therefore to carry out his theory the support should be given to the abdomen.
 No one can deny that the present up-to- date young girl is a pleasant creature to look at, as she goes swinging up Fifth av- enue or tramps on the links Her skirts are the regulation length twelve inches from the ground her boots are thick Tn the soles easy on the feet. Her figure Is compact and her waist measure anything but the waspike affair of ten years ago
 Many will say she cannot very well be improved upon. If the present agitators have their way and the diaphragm assumes such importance and Is given such free play then heaven help us; our future wo- men promise to show to the world a race of "pouter pigeon" women who will be anything but pretty to look at.
 There Is always one consolation in these great upheavals.- They must come in the course of evolution. There are many strange and weird fancies advanced at the beginning of every crusade, but In the end the chaff is generally winnowed from the wheat and only the best of all the theories retained and put into o-e-'to1,
 Therefore, it is as well 'c the reform CTS "gae their gait" and she end the best will come out of it c and we will find that without much trouble those who have been content to stand by the waystde while the procession passed by have been benefited. by all the fuss and feathers of those who have gone before.