Suzi Clarke wrote:
The loose bones and the corset bones are both roughly the same size and
thickness as modern white-covered steel bones - the ones with the tips.
They are not all identical in thickness, but it is millimetres if not
micromillimetres in difference. It is quite clear that they have been
"sliced" lengthways. (The corset is quite light by the way - far lighter
than if it was boned with steel.)
Someone on the H-Cost list a while back had some whalebone and described
it as "like a fingernail" but it was black. IIRC, "whalebone" for
corsets is the baleen, which are fairly regular in size, and thin, due
to the job they do for the whale. I could easily understand if
different sections of the baleen have different properties, though, and
maybe the ladle handles could have been made out of a thicker section,
or actual bones?
--
Cynthia Virtue and/or Cynthia du Pre Argent
"Such virtue hath my pen...." -Shakespeare, Sonnet 81
"I knew this wasn't _my_ pen!" --Cynthia Virtue
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