Mark Twain wrote a really funny parody of Victorian verbiage which I found in a compilation of his more salacious works titled "Letters from the Earth." It gave all the elaborate forms of the address to be used when asking permission to rescue a person from a fire. So, even at the time, some people realized the extreme nature of this stuff.
That said, it's amazing how much time you have to spend on things when there's no tv, and it's a certain kind of luxury to have such an abundance of words.
If a pompous man is a stuffed shirt, what is the female counterpart?
That's really an interesting question. I can't think of any counterpart, though not for lack of need. In the NYC art world, I've heard the imperious, cooly beautiful women who sit at the front desks at art galleries described as "vestial virgins." Of course, they might be men, also. Another clothing word that comes close, but is a little off the mark is "straight-laced." (Odd coincidence that the masculine refers to plumping the torso, and the feminine to cinching it...)
