The skin and its troubles.

Date:
1879
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The skin and its troubles. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    38/106 (page 32)
    the necessity is still more urgent. Disease is often directly traceable to this neglect, and the absence of clean- liness in the rearing of children is one of the most fertile sources of disease of the skin. Soap and rubbing are the great allies of water in this matter of the purification of the skin, and for very simple reasons. Soap is composed of a certain amount of alkali—potash or soda—with a less proportion of oil, and the alkali acts by partly soften- ing up or loosening the cells of the scarf-skin and so help- ing their removal, and partly by getting rid of the surface oil by forming an emulsion with it. The rubbing neces- sarily removes the softened-up dirt, and stimulates the parts to renewed action. No one, whatever his position in life, need go without the use of a piece of soap and some water, and so give the skin a chance of breathing and getting rid of impurities; the appliances are simple, and the object of the first importance to the health of the body. Cleanliness of the person almost necessarily involves a cleanly home, and to the spread of these prin- ciples is due doubtless the extinction in England of some diseases, and the diminished prevalence of others. The number of ordinary soaps offered to the public is great, and most of them are good. They are all vaunted with varying degrees of success. The great object in selecting a soap is to obtain one that has a moderate quantity of alkali. If the latter is much in excess, the result