Dear Sir,–I have been greatly intrigued by some of the recent correspondence on the subject of tight lacing, and I can assure your readers that while it was very prevalent some years ago, it was no joking matter. With several others, I was engaged in a drapery store, and we were all tight-laced to a greater or less extent.
One girl in particular always went the limit in this direction, as she was the recognised corset hand, and she fainted on more than one occasion through the sheer pressure of her stays.
Once, when we were busy reviving her, the manager–a kindly old soul–came on the scene and made inquiries. He was told that Miss G. had fainted, we thought, owing to her corsets being too tightly done up. On coming around she was sent for to the office, where the manager told her that there was really no need to go to extremes in the matter so long as she retained a neat figure.
“The old dear is quite hopeless,” she said on her return. “If I slacken my stays I can’t get into my dress, so lace me up as per usual, and I’ll contrive not to pop off when he is about. He doesn’t know it took two of us to get his own daughter into her new stays the other day.”
We were more fortunate than many, for in some shops the waist size of an assistant was decided, not by her preference in the matter, but by the manageress or departmental head; and the assistant had to conform to their dictates in the matter.
In more than one case I have known girls who were proud of their figures, and who were considerably laced in, to be told on applying for a new “shop” that her waist was “rather large, we are afraid, but we can engage you if you will conform to our requirements so far as your corset size is concerned.” I have known, too, new girls at our shop, after a few days, ask nervously if they could let, their corsets out a trifle, as at their last shop they had to be laced in so very tightly.
Many a time, when girls came to be supplied with corsets on the size being inquired, their mothers named the size and met any protests by the girl with, “My dear, you must allow me to be the best judge of your requirements,” and it was often a tearful girl whom we laced into a pair of yet smaller corsets.
Often, too, as a ruse to persuade a girl to lace in even more, her mother and the dressmaker deliberately made her dress so that it would not hook up until the waist of the wearer was still further nipped in. Most girls had to suffer to be smart in those days, and their corsets were a merciless form of torture even when vanity came to the rescue. And what a relief to get them off at night!
Faithfully yours,
MIGNON