waist. (See Plate 26.) With the increased attention to the waist, the corset was now calculated to slim the bodylines, rather than artificially alter the natural shape, as its eighteenth-century predecessors had done. Corset dimensions became a hotly contested aspect of the toilet, particularly as the waist was subjected to ever more strenuous tight lacing in an effort to increase the contrast between the constructions both above and below. The extreme hourglass shape, the subject of the 1829 cartoon "Waist and Extravagance," was also the object of criticism in _The New Monthly Magazine_ that same year, which complained that "The finest figure, thus encumbered... might be mistaken for two pillow-cases hanging on a stick, so small is the space into which the waist is compressed between these appendages.

Withturned toward the articulation of moral character through a graceful demeanor, poses, and attitudes. As one author remarked, "Graceful movement, an unaffected elegance of demeanour, is to the figure what sense and sweetness are to the eyes. It is the soul looking out. It is what a poet has called the 'thought of the body.'

The main effect of this type of costume upon a woman's deportment was a limitation of movement; furthermore, the shoulders narrowed and dress imparted a drooping appearance, as the body seemed to be pulled downwards. The extended bodice was ornamented in a manner that heightened the appearance of length. For instance, the pleated fabric overlays that had been a feature of decoration in the 1830s were being applied by the 1840s on an exaggerated