Page:The physical training of children (IA 39002011126464.med.yale.edu).pdf/297

 and unnecessary fear. A person, immediately after using a warm bath, should take proper precautions—that is to say, he must not expose himself to draughts, neither ought he to wash himself in cold water, nor should he, immediately after taking one, drink cold water. But he may follow his usual exercise or employment, provided the weather be fine, and the wind be neither in the east nor the northeast. Every house of any pretension ought to have a bath-room. Nothing would be more conducive to health than regular systematic bathing. A hot and cold bath, a sitz bath and a shower bath—each and all in their turn—are grand requisites to preserve and procure health. If the house cannot boast of a bath-room, then the Corporation baths (which nearly every large town possesses) ought to be liberally patronized. 309. What is the best application for the hair?

A sponge and cold water, and two good hair-brushes. Avoid grease, pomatum, bandaline, and all abominations of that kind. There is a natural oil of the hair, which is far superior to either Rowland's Macassar oil or any other oil! The best scent for the hair is an occasional dressing of soap and water; the best beautifier of the hair is a downright thorough good brushing with two good hair-brushes! Again, I say, ''avoid grease of all kinds to the hair''. "And as for women's hair, don't plaster it with scented and sour grease, or with any grease; it has an oil of its own. And don't tie up your hair tight, and make it like a cap of iron over your scull. And why are your ears covered? You hear all the worse, and they are not the clearer. Besides, the ear is beautiful in itself, and plays its own part in the concert of the features."

If the hair cannot, without some application, be kept tidy, then a little of the best sweet oil might, by means of an old tooth-brush, be used to smoothe it; sweet oil is,