Page:Personal beauty how to cultivate and preserve it in accordance with the laws of health (1870).djvu/220

 exercise discrimination. One of the favorite articles, the only one which will produce that teint mat, which we have previously described, as almost monopolized by the noble ladies of Italy, who hardly ever see the sun, and which was all the rage at Paris a year or so ago, is bismuth. The apothecary sells it under the name of "pearl powder," "pearl white," and "bismuthine cream." Several forms of the mineral are used, but most commonly the subnitrate, though the famous French cosmetic fard blanc de bismuth, is what chemists call a subchloride.

Some physicians have decried this metal in both these forms as injurious to the skin and unsafe to the general health. There is doubt about this opinion. We have given it for months, both internally and externally, without any ill results, and do not feel convinced that it is more objectionable on the score of health than French chalk. It has, indeed, in common with all the metallic substances used for this purpose, one serious drawback. They are all changed by sulphurous gases into dark gray sulphurets, and as luck will have it, our coal fires and gas-pipes are constantly ready, whenever opportunity is allowed them, to fill the apartment with just such gases. The consequence is that on not a few occasions, ladies, who at the outset of the evening displayed complexions which made their rivals ready to tear their hair with envy, have come to grief in the most unexpected manner, and been obliged