CLOTHING AND HEALTH

Evening Post, Volume CXI, Issue 82, 7 April 1926, Page 4

CLOTHING AND HEALTH

y/HAT TO WEAR AND WHY

'EFFECTS OF ULTRA-VIOLET HAYS.

| r' »We wear clothes for decoration, defence, and decency (not.'to mention and ostentation): and -.ap'par■'^iitly decoration came first in. our long ' ancestral history, writes Dr. C. W. 'Slleeby, P.K.S.E., in "Overseas."Herbert Spencer Baid that, similarly, decorStion precedes usefulness in education, f^Mich is the way wo dress our childtren's minds. There is a whole philoteopny of clothes, and the hygiene of the {subject alone is enough for many v.olSumes, extant and to come. Hera I only <<>n>r the -reader a few general ::princijples, with-a few quite'new points, afffecting all three of the objects for ijwhich we. jclothe ourselves. . »■ , i!_^.Suico ideas of decency-vary from age fe age and frontier to frontier, and Ipipee ■ the customary comes everywhere sift, be regarded as decent, we need say Siitle more about it, except only that, '.until very ..recently in. civilised comijjtries, ideas; qf decency have been deplorably unhygienic and have certainly Hhelped to spread and''maintain tuberleulgsia—the white plague: and also ttliat this lamentable fact applies far fißbre seriously to-tropical islands and hot places where missionaries biavo sought .to impose clothing upon the •|j'4tives as part'of 'their new religion, jkith widespread injury to health.. The ijbatural and best clothing in very hot i|JK>untries -is the' deeply pigmented skin jwftho "livery of the burnished sun," iks Othello' calls' 'it—which has been 'evolved as a natural protection throughf'bttt long ages, and the delicately adapted functions of which are thrown uttor--3y out of gear by-anything at all liko *our European clothing—which, at least i'as worn now by men, is in many ways 'iuS-foolish and, insanitary as it is hideous. I urge the importance of adapt[■ing our clothes to climate, and I warn Spaders of the folly of supposing that [European clothes are best for:all lnanpcind just when we have overwhelming{'ijS' proved that, whomsoever they may [.■fee good forj they, are'ce'rtainly very bad Lf<sr Europeans. !■■ v ljast summer; when presiding at the !,ift;st annual. dinner. .of the Sunlight league, in London, the Dean of St. Paul's reminded the company that, the lifieient Greeks laughed at other peoples iMbarbarians, as the Greeks called them -^because they wore' go many clothes. Greeks were right' in this, as in eifejnuch els"c, aS we have.lately come to Seam. To-day,' all over the civilised world, doctors are imitating the consummate and noble Greek Hippocrates, j-tSe Father of Medicine, who used to iinake his patients do exeiicises without tottt their (relatively few) 'clothes, in fjthe pure air and sunlight, of the island ?of Cos, where stood the Temple of pjlesculapiuij in which Hippocratesl was ia'priest. The Greek word for this praettice was gymnastics—a word often used Sto'-day in forgetfulness that it means fgetting one's ;clothes off. ! -Mo-day children at least can and do Aegin to^gar.-.fewer clothes: but even „JioW—thpijgh'.-perhaps . not in happy i'JJew Zealand^ where* Sir. "^ruby King Ifcajs taughfc tlie mo.ihers soVeil7--much jtofjour time .tat infant, welfare ;centres ti& the Old!; Country is', spent, in. taking 'off the ijler|dibly numerous layers of lathes in*!whieh so many of the inpfants are; injprisoned, starved of light Satfd air, i,id'.prevented from breathing ffriely. ' ,^tir tight clothing,, anywhere, ifctjany agK is an abomination.) . Yoilng !.wemen itt-thfese,.days -do. admirably, and Si'rejoice that the teaching of hygienic [science, should-haveGround support from rlleah'-'liig'l,'against' the- 'older View, :.,which thought dragging skirts, infect'jed^witlr tubercle''and other noxious 1 f'facili*, decent, but clean ankles inde[feent:' i -Xi'et it'- be" laid ■ down -that' the ji*'chest protector".: -was' a chest beptrayer,,.. and ; .. .that : the ."pneumonia ffclouse," falsely so-called, is an enemy ►■pf pneumonia, for it helps the ventilactioiU;.of the., skin,.;promotes, or :at least - . its.' natural function; of maini.itaini'ngiihe temperature of the body at -.exactly the right' level and: also helps I'the natural. „circulation through the V Jungs, whereby they receive "plentiful :;'and fty.errrenewed supplies of .munitions ■in the blood, against any germs' of : jtubercleVprieumo'nia, and so forth, which may invade : them. All medical observers , tp:day, supported, by all statistics ■ of tuberculosis and anaemia, and all •students of .athletics are agreed as to ■the vastly improved -physique and of our girls and young -women. '/The reason is evident: they have been restored to the light and the 'breath of life, thanks to the abolition ■ of the disgusting clothing of the nineteenth century. ' I advisedly say diswgusting, partly because much of n, that Jclothing was rarely, if ever, washed (•(e.g., k corset), and partly because the preleas of -decency which therein found were in themselves disgusting to mind endowed with any ' sense of Jbeauty or reverence for the 'achievements of. .creative, evolution.

; The casts'of men "is very hard. Their I.conservatism and fear of ridicule are '. their, chief enemies. But' what could V,be more ridiculous than a choking colilar which requires hard work to loosen * when, for instance, one is trying to •help a motor-cyclist knocked down in ?\the street? The fainting girl no longer '< needs someone to deal with neckband jand corset: but, indeed, the- girl of rto-day is almost rationally dad and fdoes not faint. Most difficult of all is the case of the r \vhite man in the tropics.. Biologically, |he has no business to be there. The > process of acclimatisation takes many jlong generations. He must "go native," as deep as his skin, though no ■further: but yet he must maintain his : conventional dignity. The. problem is [almost insoluble. A reader from BomTbay asks "me several interesting and ex- . eessively difficult questions. I can 1 only say that the pigmented skin should '■be, as nearly as'possible, the "only j.'wear" in the tropics, and that there 'is practically no limit to the amount of fXpure) water that can be drunk to be 'used for perspiration' to carry away the ibodily heat and keep the blood as cool fas it should be. The individual must /judge for himself; but the exposed and Lpigmentod, and thus-active and adaptfedj skin is the ideal. It is almost f hopeless to discuss "ihe ideal regimen of i clothing in continuous moist .heat; but ia free, full flow of water through the jbody, a very small diet, absolutely no 'alcohol, and the irreducible minimum of j clothing, will do what is possible. ; Dr. A. P. Hess, in New York, in •"1921, began to study clothing in respect /of its transparency to the ultra-violet irays of the sun without which none of 'j us could live. In 1922 I brought' some jepecimens of materials studied by him fback to London, and the subject has ;been prosecuted by the Committee on bLight, which the Medical Research '.Council appointed at my suggestion "early in that year. A notable finding is fthat the vegetablo cellulose called arti- : ficial silk—white for choice—transmits .much ultra-violet light, and I strongfly recommend it for stockings and iblouses accordingly; and for men's 'shirts for tennis and cricket, and so "forth. Real silk, an animal protein, ! transmits relatively very littlo ultraviolet light. All tissues and textures used for a single layer of clothing Bhould henceforth be tested and appraised in respect of their power to transinifr'ihis most-precious,constituent of the light'of:'./life' \ It is t&B vold-and'' ever new word of wisdom, yet again: Back to Nature, who "can be commanded only by obeying Her.' J :: ' .