Page:Personal beauty how to cultivate and preserve it in accordance with the laws of health (1870).djvu/255

 She found by smoking for a few minutes several times a day she could live with perfect comfort. It is not likely that the remedy would have so desirable an effect on every one, as the complaint is extremely obstinate.

The itching and burning with which girls are affected often depend upon worms, or upon some disturbance of the digestion.

The parts can be washed several times a day with one of these lotions, which should not be wiped off:—

Take— Powdered borax     a half ounce; Rain water         a pint. Mix.

Or,

Take hyposulphite of soda, and water, the same quantities.

Or this unguent:—

Take— Bicarbonate of soda     two ounces: Tincture of benzoin     one ounce.

Mix, and rub a small portion on the part while in bed.

As we have said, there may be no eruption whatever, and yet the severest itching. Therefore, except as the skin is torn by scratching, such complaints hardly come within our present scheme. But when some visible sign is present, especially on the exposed parts, it is time for active interference. The women of to-day must not despair, like Anne of Austria, wife of Louis XIII., of France.