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CHAP. IX.] which medical authorities have raised to flannel being worn next to the skin have arisen from observations on the poor, who often will put on a flannel shirt or vest and keep it on till it almost falls to pieces. When I was house-surgeon to a London hospital I have more than once noticed an expression of surprise when a patient suffering from a skin affection was asked when his flannel shirt was last washed, the idea that a flannel shirt required washing never apparently having occurred to him. Such habits, combined with a total absence of any general ablution of the body, will, no doubt engender that tendency to chill and to taking cold which is so unjustly put down to the wearing of flannel by some writers. Where a flannel is washed at reasonable intervals, say at least once a week, and if the whole body is bathed daily, only good can come from wearing it next the skin. I have never known any harm to result, but only good, after ordering such underclothing for patients, which I am constantly doing,"