shift, which, in earlier times at least, was sleeveless, over it was drawn the stola, a tunic with sleeves, which, as a rule, covered the upper part of the arm only, and which were clasped, not sewn, together. This upper tunic was extremely long, and was caught up by a hip-girdle, forming broad folds and gathers about the waist; and bands were worn beneath to support, but never to distort, the figure. Sometimes a second girdle encompassed the waist. The palla, or mantle, was worn out of doors only, and endless were the graceful and becoming ways of arranging it, partly over the head and draped about the figure.

The numberless folds at once revealed and concealed the figure, protected from heat and cold, and admitted of almost every variety of form; the shapely limbs of Hellenic or Italian dames were thus displayed, yet shrouded; their necklaces, earrings, and other ornaments, were often magnificent; and their feet, not buried like. ours in stiff cases, were visible through the elegant sandal.

How gracefully the dress followed the movements of the body, may be perceived better from the small coloured clay figures in the British Museum [Greek Room], than even from marble statues, for they represent the ordinary domestic manners and are not carefullyposed and idealised goddesses. I have roughly sketched a few, which we may suppose to be the simple people

as they went about Greek streets, hiding their hands from the sun in the folds of their mantles, defending their heads against sharp winds and showers.

No. 5-might be a handmaiden with a kerchief around her curls, chatting by the wayside on a spring morning ; 6-may be a lady strolling in the June sunshine, her throat and hands well defended; 7-perhaps a serving lass, busy and unconscious amid her market avocations,

FIG. 5.

FIG. 6.

FIG. 7.

FIG. 8.

with uncovered hair, as in Germany and Italy they go barehead still, in summer; 8-looks like some wise and comely matron intent on some good errand, as she hastens through the bleak winds and miry grounds of wintry weather.

The absurd parody of the dress, adopted by the last century enthusiasts, whom I have elsewhere christened the 'Imitation Greeks,' was bad, because it missed the

spirit of the old costume. It concealed and shrouded nothing, it was indelicate without being picturesque, the absence of folds rendered it poor and weak in effect, and the practice of forcing the high waist into a small compass impossible, through the anatomy of the ribs, rendered it as dangerous as it was ugly, owing to various diseases brought on by exposure and pressure. As for the feet, the thin pumps with ribbons were a mere caricature of the pretty and sensible sandal; and those unblest with perfect feet and figures must have had a very sad time of it.

What Stays Cost Us.

The mischievous person who first brought in stays (some suppose her to have been Mademoiselle Pantine, a mistress of Marshal Saxe, others say, an early Norman lady—and, no doubt, from very early times stiff stays have been worn) is to blame for the first and greatest defect of modern appearance-the grotesque outline of the body-and many a dire disease.

We are not denying the necessity for some close fitting garment as a support to the body, and an improvement to the figure; people who refuse to wear any corset at all look very slovenly; but we must protest against a machine that, pretending to be a servant

is, in fact, a tyrant-that, aspiring to embrace, hugs like a bear-crushing in the ribs, injuring the lungs and heart, the stomach, and many other internal organs. The Eastern lady who, pitied for her dull harem life, said she

more pitied English wives, whose husbands (as she innocently thought) 'locked them up in a box,' was not far wrong. And all to what end? The end of looking like a wasp, and losing the whole charm of graceful

E

human movement and easy carriage—the end of communicating an over-all-ish sense of deformity! Nothing is so ugly as a pinched waist; it puts the

FIG. 11.-Natural position of the organs. FIG. 12.-Deformed position of the organs.

hips and shoulders invariably out of proportion in width, and it is a practice more culpable than the Chinese one

FIG. 13.-Natural form of the waist.

FIG. 14.-Artificial form of the waist.

of deforming the foot-in this case, no vital organ is interfered with, whilst in deforming the waist, almost all