Sixty out of every one hundred American girls have poor skins. When I say poor skins, I am trying to soften what seems to be a very harsh statement.
What I really mean to say is, that out of one hundred youthful faces taken at random from any congregation of young people, at the most generous estimate, about forty per cent. will be free from the blemishes we all know and loathe, and are content to abide by and with-pimples and other equally disgusting accompaniments of an ill-conditioned skin.
And this state of affairs exists despite the fact that twenty millions of dollars Are annually expended in the United States for cosmetics, facial treatments and alleged cures for an almost national defect.American women are, as a rule, not stupid-yet they are singularly gullible on this one point.
Every thinking person must know that a bad skin is the result of an internal disorder or external neglect. External neglect may be summed up in one word “uncleanliness.” Internal troubles, I grieve to say, may be too often fastened on the all-prevailing pie of our beloved land.
When I say pie I generalize. I mean to include all those soft, pasty, creamy, delectable stomach-destroyers which the girls of today are offering to their stomachs week in and week out, in place of food that will nourish and produce red corpuscles instead of white.
Frequently I go to a dairy kitchen near my office for a hurried luncheon, and I am always spellbound for the first few moments by the apparently irresistible, swift recurring wave of pie-eating that pervades the entire establishment.
Long ago our Puritan ancestors did some of us an evil turn by way of saleratus bread and soda biscuit. Too much saleratus will upset the best little stomach in the world, and when a good little stomach is insulted day by day, it retorts by throwing out through the blood, a lot of nasty little pimples, with a sort of ” Now, there!”
And our grandmothers are somewhat to blame for the unhealthy pallor they bequeathed our mothers, which was caused by the bread of the ante-yeast period. Nowadays we can get good, wholesome bread, even the least of us-and girls, if you could but believe it, a six mouths’ course of bread-and-milk luncheons would so improve most of your skins, as to make you the wonder of all the neighborhood not in the secret.
If you were on the second floor of a dwelling house, and a large spot appeared upon the ceiling, you would go to the third floor and find out what had caused the discoloration. If you found your little sister seated on the floor directly over the spot peacefully and contentedly pouring molasses in a steady stream out of a pretty molasses jug, would you apply a kalsomine or a wash to the spot below, or would you insist that nothing could remove the discolored spot till the small girl above gave over pouring molasses on the floor?
That is about the way it is. Pie, Boston cream puffs, chocolate eclaires, and all the rest of them. Oh! if you but knew the havoc they make with your pretty little noses, your saucy chins, and innocent brows. It is just the case of a little girl pouring molasses on the floor above.
FOSSATI CREAM FOR PIMPLES Lanolin …. 5 grammes. Sweet almond oil…. 5 grammes. Sulphur precipitate…. 5 grammes. Oxide of zinc …. 2 1/2 grammes. Extract of violet …. 10 drops.
Apply a very little of the cream to the pimples; wait until the pimples are cured before using the face brush, which might irritate them.
Many women are troubled each Spring with an outbreak of pimples, and the skin of others turns a muddy, yellowish. and disagreeable hue.The causes for both conditions are practically the same. The subject has violated the rules of hygiene through her diet.Tea,coffee, cocoa, chocolate, sweets,pork, and buckwheat cakes are the things to leave off. A regimen consisting of fruits, green vegetables, celery, water cress, spinach, and the like, and just as much hot water as can be comfortably drank, is the cure.
Sulphur soap is used frequently with good effect in some cases. There are several good sulphur soaps procurable at any first-class drug store.
A celebrated French woman, noted for her beauty, declares that she will cure any ordinary skin eruptions known under the general term of “pimples,” by vegetable diet, saline purgatives, ointment of tar, and lanolin and sulphur baths.
I indorse this regimen heartily, although I am obliged to say that very few American women, in my opinion, would follow it strictly and persistently long enough to experience its good effect.