Page:Every Woman's Encyclopedia Volume 1.djvu/500

 B«:aUTV How to Preserve the Complexion "Without Having Recourse to Artificial Methods — Enemies of the Skin — The Use of Soap — Complexion and Digestion — Sunburnt and Chapped Skins ^ posterous ! " says the average mother, to whom the word " beauty-culture " only means face massage, complexion lotions, powder, rouge, and " transformations." But the truth is that you cannot have beauty without health, so the foundation of good looks must be laid in the nursery, and although no mother can endow her daughter with large, dark eyes, or a Grecian nose, most of the other attributes to beauty can be developed by judicious care in youth. All healthy babies are born with good complexions, with the potentialities of a good head of hair, an erect, well-set-up figure, good teeth, a graceful carriage, pretty manners, and a sweet expression. These seven items will make any woman pass for pretty, even if her eyes are small and her features irregular. It rests with her mother, therefore, to see that the small, pink, podgy infant develops into the charm- ing woman, whose appearance is a pleasure to everyone she meets. No doubt there are a few exceptional beings whose vitality is such that they grow up beautiful against all odds, who can scrub their faces with strong soap and hard water immediately after meals, and yet retain a complexion to advanced old age. But such happy mortals are rare, and the average girl baby grows up " ordinary looking" merely from neglect in the nursery. No amount of care, of " exercises " and " treatments," when a girl has passed seventeen, will entirely remedy the damage done by carelessness before that age. The Complexion I speak of girls, because it is so important for a girl to be outwardly pleasing; her looks are the pretty binding which attract people to glance inside the book, and see the real sterUng merit of the work. But it is really quite as important nowadays for men to be well set up, well groomed, and youthful-looking, and however much little boys may rebel in the nursery, they will be thankful to their mothers in later life for having trained them in the habits which will help to improve their appearance. Take, to begin with, baby's complexion. N o face powder, not even the ten-shillings- a-box variety, can reproduce the exquisite bloom of a clear, fine-grained, velvety, white skin such as any ordinary baby possesses. It is really worth while taking a little pains to preserve it — at any rate in girl babies. The four great enemies of the skin are hard water, bad soap, indigestion, and ex- posure. Soft Water The first of these, hard water, is respon- sible for the great majority of rough and coarsened skins. If a complexion census were taken of Great Britain, it would be seen that, on the average, women in places where the water is soft — Essex, parts of Ireland and of Devonshire — ^have far better skins than women in places like London, Hereford, and the South Coast, where the water is hard. This is partly because soft water is much more cleansing, and dirt ruins the skin ; and partly because hard water contains microscopic particles which literally scratch the delicate surface. Some skins resist its action better than others, no doubt, but all suffer in time, and the increased use of powder within the last few years may be traced to the introduction of " company's " water, which is mostly hard, in place of the rain-butts and well- water which our grandmothers used. In the country, rainwater can generally be arranged for ; in towns, it is apt to be too dirty to use ; but distilled water is equally good, and may be had from any stores or chemist's at 4|d. or 6d. a gallon, with a small deposit on the jar, A gallon will last one person a week or more, and it should always be used cold. Nurse and child should be taught that the face must never be washed in the bath- water. Morning and evening washing of the face is quite sufficient unless some journey or other cause of extra dirt has arisen. The habit many people have of scrubbing their children's complexions a dozen times a day is perfectly deplorable ; it upsets the natural action of the skin and widens the pores till they seem to attract and hold the dirt, instead of letting it lie on
 * ' Deauty culture in my nursery I Pre-