Page:Personal beauty how to cultivate and preserve it in accordance with the laws of health (1870).djvu/313

 expression on the features. The neck may be overgrown by a short unmanageable growth. The eyebrows are occasionally connected by scattered bristles. In brunettes, especially, there is liability to the appearance of a delicate moustache on the upper lip, and a development of coarseish dark hair on the forearms. After a certain age, particularly in single women, both chin and upper lip are apt to be invaded by a short beard, not at all attractive. Moles and birth-marks are usually planted with a hairy growth, and in the nostrils and the ears a bristly tuft is often found. All these are incompatible with good looks, and in the interest of beauty should be removed.

We might add some curious examples of "bearded women." They are by no means rare, and hardly a season passes by, that one or more are not exhibited by some travelling showman. The cause of their peculiarity seems to lie in an over-excited condition of the hair bulbs, which usually commences in youth. Julia Pastrana was a Spanish opera dancer of some celebrity, who a few years ago visited England and, we believe, this country also. She had a fine silken beard about four inches in length, and was unusually hairy over the whole of her body. Still more curious, she had with her a little daughter, but a few years old, whose body already showed signs of the Esau-like hairiness which characterized her mother.

Some diseases are accompanied or followed by an