CHAPTER II.
ON INFANCY, AND THE DRESSES ADAPTED TO THAT PERIOD OF LIFE.
To illustrate our peculiar views on this important subject we shall commence with the period when the infant is first ushered into this "breathing world," and trace its progress through the various stages of infancy, childhood, adolescence, womanhood, and old age; describing in our progress the evils arising from improper dressing and treatment, together with the means which have been found most efficacious in their prevention or remedy. It must be remembered that in the adaptation which we have invented, our object has not been so much the cure of malformation, as the prevention of its occurrence. Taking the perfection of female beauty as our standard, our inventions are for the purpose of preserving it in that condition where it exists; or should any deviation from that standard have taken place, our endeavours are directed to the restoration to the normal form. It is universally acknowledged that a good figure may be made a bad one by an injudicious mode of dressing; and if such be the case—if the human body will yield to injurious pressure, thereby producing deformity, an opposite course must produce opposite effects, and by a certain adaptation of means, an imperfect or declining figure be brought, if not into a state of absolute perfection, at least into one very closely approximating to it. We do not profess to perform impossibilities, but do confidently assert that in the course of a short time the method which we adopt, if fairly carried out, will do more for the promotion of health, elegance of figure, and prevention of disease, than all the medicine which may be administered
