Killer Outfit

We have done our best to be patient under an evil which we hoped would be short-lived. We have had no comfort in social meetings, because no dinner table and no ballroom, no box or stall at the theatres, no carriage, and no boat, could accommodate both our families and ourselves. We have found it difficult and disagreeable to walk with our wives and daughters on pavements, and in lanes and country footpaths, made for people more naturally dressed.

We have seen the choicest flowers in our gardens, and the most cherished plants in our greenhouses cut off by the hoop… and have lost all our pleasure on board steamboats, from the anxiety of watching lest any of our party should sweep a child over into the lake or river.

The year: 1861. The place: Earth. The crime: Murder. The suspect? Crinolines. (Warning to sensitive readers: knocking a kid off a boat is the least gruesome way people got murked by skirts.) [via]