Page:Personal beauty how to cultivate and preserve it in accordance with the laws of health (1870).djvu/280

 In older persons the plan that should be adopted is different. Their hair should be examined, scissors in hand, once a month, but not with a view of curtailing its length. The plan suggested by that distinguished writer on Skin Diseases, Mr. Erasmus Wilson, though a tedious one, is undoubtedly superior to all others. The locks, he recommends, should be carefully scrutinized, and wherever a hair is found with a split, a twisted, a dead, or a discolored extremity, it should be cut off down to the healthy portion. All others should be left undisturbed. By this simple procedure, the hair is sure to be maintained in full vigor, and will constantly increase in length. It may be somewhat tedious, but what woman who sets much store by her flowing locks would not be willing to devote say two or three hours a month to this procedure? We positively state that this is the only kind of hair-cutting which one with healthy hair should submit to under ordinary circumstances.

We make this latter proviso, for we have met cases where the hair had to be kept short for considerations of general health. Some women suffer much from headache, which will not yield to any treatment until the hair is shortened. Others have found that by some sympathy difficult to explain, the eyesight was improved by trimming their locks. Such instances are rare, but as they are so often overlooked, it is well to give them a passing mention. The sympathy between