ona_. It was at
the end of the fourteenth century that Isabeau of Bavaria
introduced the custom of showing the breasts uncovered, and the
word "corset" was then used for the first time.

Stratz, in his _Frauenkleidung_ (pp. 366 et seq.), and in his
_Schoenheit des Weiblichen Koerpers_, Chapters VIII, X, and XVI,
also deals with the corset, and illustrates the results of
compression on the body. For a summary of the evidence concerning
the difference of respiration in man and woman, its causes and
results, see Havelock Ellis, _Man and Woman_, fourth edition,
1904, pp. 228-244. With reference to the probable influence of
the corset and unsuitable clothing generally during early life in
impeding the development of the mammary glands, causing inability
to suckle properly, and thus increasing infant mortality, see
especially a paper by Professor Bollinger (_Correspondenz-blatt
Deutsch. Gesell. Anthropologie_, October, 1899).

The compression caused by the corset, it must be added, is not
usually realized or known by those who wear it. Thus, Rushton
Parker and Hugh Smith found, in two independent series of
measurements, that the waist measurement was, on the average, two
inches less over the corset than round the naked waist; "the
great majority seemed quite unaware of the fact." In one case the
difference was as much as five inches. (_British Medical
Journal_, September 15 and 22, 1900.)

The breasts and the developed hips are characteristics of women and are
indications of functional effectiveness as well as sexual allurement.
Another prominent sexual character which belongs to man, and is not
obviously an index of function, is furnished by the hair on the face. The
beard may be regarded as purely a sexual adornment, and thus comparable to
the somewhat similar growth on the heads of many male animals. From this
point of view its history is interesting, for it illustrates the tendency
with increase of civilization not merely to dispense with sexual
allurement in the primary sexual organs, but even to disregard those
growths which would appear to have been developed solely to act as sexual
allurements. The cultivation of the beard belongs peculiarly to barbarous
races. Among these races it is frequently regarded as the most sacred and
beautiful part of the person, as an object to swear by, an object to which
the slightest insult mus