9.  About seven years ago an article was discovered for the stiffening of corsets, which has revolutionized the corset industry of the world.  This article is manufactured from the natural fibers of the Mexican Ixtle plant, and is known as Coraline.  It consists of straight, stiff fibers like bristles bound together into a cord by being wound with two strands of thread passing in opposite directions.  This produces an elastic fiber intermediate in stiffness between twine and whalebone.  It cannot break, but it possesses all the stiffness and flexibility necessary to hold the corset in shape and prevent its wrinkling.

We congratulate the ladies of to-day upon the advantages they enjoy over their sisters of two centuries ago, in the forms and the graceful and easy curves of the corsets now made as compared with those of former times.

[Illustration]

[Illustration:  Forms of Corsets in the time of Elizabeth of England.]

[Illustration:  EGYPTIAN CORSET.]

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TIGHT-LACING.

It destroys natural beauty and creates an unpleasant and irritable temper.  A tight-laced chest and a good disposition cannot go together.  The human form has been molded by nature, the best shape is undoubtedly that which she has given it.  To endeavor to render it more elegant by artificial means is to change it; to make it much smaller below and much larger above is to destroy its beauty; to keep it cased up in a kind of domestic cuirass is not only to deform it, but to expose the internal parts to serious injury.  Under such compression as is commonly practiced by ladies, the development of the bones, which are still tender, does not take place conformably to the intention of nature, because nutrition is necessarily stopped, and they consequently become twisted and deformed.

[Illustration:  THE NATURAL WAIST. THE EFFECTS OF LACING.]

Those who wear these appliances of tight-lacing often complain that they cannot sit upright without them—­are sometimes, indeed, compelled to wear them during all the twenty-four hours; a fact which proves to what extent such articles weaken the muscles of the trunk.  The injury does not fall merely on the internal structure of the body, but also on its beauty, and on the temper and feelings with which that beauty is associated.  Beauty is in reality but another name for expression of countenance, which is the index of sound health, intelligence, good feelings and peace of mind.  All are aware that uneasy feelings, existing habitually in the breast, speedily exhibit their signature on the countenance, and that bitter thoughts or a bad temper spoil the human expression of its comeliness and grace.

[Illustration:  NATURAL HAIR.]

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THE CARE OF THE HAIR.