Page:Personal beauty how to cultivate and preserve it in accordance with the laws of health (1870).djvu/190

 second class laiteries, and served out to their customers."

After that, we always regarded café au lait with a suspicious eye. The expense, however, need not deter those who would use it for a sponge bath, as two quarts amply suffice for this purpose.

The use of natural mineral waters for ablutions must be regarded rather as a means of curing actual disease, than of preserving health. They are all inferior in the latter respect to the water distilled by the sun in the alembic of the clouds, which descends to the earth in refreshing showers.

Sea-bathing is now so fashionable in summer, that we cannot avoid speaking of it from a cosmetic point of view. It is an admirable tonic to the general system, and increases the activity of the circulation and secretion in a marked degree. Thus it often materially improves the looks. Moreover, one of the most important points about it is that at the sea-shore people will bathe daily, while at home they won't. But as an author of reputation remarks, "As an agent for preserving the softness and delicacy of the healthy skin, and the bright hues of the complexion, it is inferior to the tepid bath." Those who live by the sea are often robust and comely, but rarely have transparent and fine skins.

The tepid bath means one whose temperature is from 80° Fahr. to 90°. When taken daily, one should not