LOVELINESS.

Auckland Star, Volume LXII, Issue 85, 11 April 1931, Page 4 (Supplement)

LOVELINESS.

BEAUTY DOWN THE AGES. ' A CONSTANT PURSUIT. (By ELIZABETH CRAIG.) You may wish to become a divine blonde with skin like peaches and cream, and hair a ripple of sunbeams meshed in silken cobwebs. You may prefer to emulate the brunette whose cheeks still glow through Lido tan. Since time began, we women have preened, and primped, and tried as a rule to make the most of our beauty. Many of us who have. not been gifted with good looks have become noted for them through nothing but perfect makeup. 1 Still others have earned fame for their beautiful hair, lovely eyes or exquisite. complexion. Looking down the ages, one finds amusing notes on rites practiced in the pursuit of bea,uty. When you read that a g/and seigneur of the period of Henry IV. exclaimed on learning of the, fashion of washing the hands: "Why should one wash: one's hands when one does not wash one's feet," you are amazed that there was any success in the cult of I beauty- • ■ ' Cleanliness Unknown.

In spite of the fact that washing was not customary in the Middle Ages, les grandes coquettes from time immemorial have always revelled in a variety of ablutions. Poppaea, the beautiful wife of Nero, is reputed to have bathed in asses' milk and the juice of strawberries, brought to her bath of porphyry by-black slaves. Isabel of Bavaria, the wife of Charles VII., delighted in a bath of marjoram water. Dianne de Poictiers bathed every morning in rain water. Anne Boleyn was obviously another famous devotee of bathing if we are to believe the legend that certain, of Anne Boleyn's courtiers flattered her by drinking her health in some of ber bath water. In olden days some beauties laved their faces with elderfiower water, some with strawberry juice. The Gauls, whose vivid carnation complexions were the envy of all other peoples, used froth of beer or chalk dissolved in vinegar. The Italians depended on belladonna for improving their complexions. But it fell to the Roman ladies to discover a cosmetic no modern mondaine would care for —blood of the hare. Times have also changed since the days when people condemned cleanliness as a "baleful remnant of ancient times." In France talcum powder still covers a multitude of. sins, but in England and the United States, Turkish baths, face masks, ice packs and other modern treatments are regularly taken in addition to ordinary baths.

If you have a perfect complexion, not only must you bathe every day, but you must give up a certain time to cultivating a beautiful complexion. Regular Study, Given regular skin treatment, euch as muscle-strapping, after cleansing with a good cleansing cream and skin tonic, and muscle-strapping during which the skin of the face and neck is moulded instead of massaged, followed by whatever kind of face mask that suits one's particular skin, the skin immediately begins to look more youthful, more alive. In Vienna, youth mask is said to be the last word in modern beauty treatment. Consisting of Diatherny or deep electrical treatment, it nourishes the tissues of the skin, and generally strengthens up the muscles of the face. The last word in make-up is a delicate nuance. Tlic orange, the tanned the carnation tinted complexion is finished. If you want to be bien soignee from top to toe, you must be an artist in make-up, shadowing the lower part of your eyelids with eye paste to enhance the beauty of your eyes, imparting only a delicate blcam to your cheeks, and deepening the red of your lips, only to emphasise them.