THE STRAW HAT AND DISEASE. (Birmingham Daily Mail.)

Otago Witness, Issue 2481, 2 October 1901, Page 66

THE STRAW HAT AND DISEASE. (Birmingham Daily Mail.)

The bacteriologist is always ranking 'orae fearful discovery or other calculated to up^et the equanimity of the neurotic. He has now found that a great and positive danger lurks in the saucy little stiaw hat, which if so fashionable with womenkind of all cla t -se s; . Until the bacteriologist, with his hoi rid suggestions and discoveries, came along, it never entered into the calculation of man or woman that the straw hat was really a sort of playground for germs and bacilli. And yet there is now no doubt about it. Each straw hat i« literally teeming with bacilli. So long as the bacilli regains in the straw, it does not much matter. But the student of the bacteriological laboratory is nothing if not observant. He notices habits and mannerisms which escape the remark of other*, and so he ha.s made a note of the fact that among womenkind it i* a custom to fasten on their straw hats with long metallic pins, which are thrust through the straw and the hair. The securing of a tricky little "sailor," with its dainty ribbons, or an upstanding Leghorn, with its elaboration of feathers and chiffon, on the top of a wonderfuJ coiffure is one of woman's triumphs. It is quite outside the province of clumsyfingered man to fasten on a woman's hat — and perhaps it is as well that it is so. With her deft fingers she has the thing fixed up in no time. But it is just the "fixing-up" which leads to the danger apprehended by the bacteriologist. In the matter of dress, particularly, ladies have a faculty for adapting themselves to the requirements of the moment, and those who have had the privilege of seeing lovely woman fasten on her hat recall the fact that sometimes she holds her hat pins between her pretty lips. It is not a very cleanly habit, and if taxed with it, many ladies will indignantly repudiate the imputation. But it is nevertheless a fact that .many women do, whilst fastening on their straw hats, hold their hatpins in their mouths. This characteristic has been observed by the bacteriologist, and it clearly reveals to him how the bacilli of the straw hat are conveyed to the mouth, and lien.ee into the alimentary canal or the respiratory organs. The pins, after being thrust through the straw, are covered with the minute bacilli, and when placed between the lips they find a congenial region in which, to develop their activities. Thrice happy in their dalliance on the luscious, red hps of beauty, the tiny organisms multiply rapidly, and. passing through the mouth, enter the .svtem. and, it is feared, bring about the debilitated state which blanches the cheek and robs the eye of it<= lustre. This is the new terror which is placed before us, for it concerns man no less than woman. Men may not u.se hat pin.%. and hold them in their mouths, but with bacilli on the lips of -women, there is the danger of them being soon conveyed to the lips of man, for chivalry is not fiuite dead, and osculation is still numbered among the pleasures of young Lfe. Given a pair of pretty, poutinsj lips, the amorous youth -would overlook the bacilli. But, then, love always was blind— except to a comely face and a shapely foot. However, the bacteriologist has spoken. He has pointed out the danger of straw hats, and if women will go on polluting their ruby lips, with all the attendant dangers, and communicating the bacilli to their male admirers, it is no fault of his. He has put his finger on a positive danger— he can do no more. He cannot stop the sale of straw hats or confiscate all the hair pins, but he can, is he has done, draw attention to the grave danger he has discovered. The rest he mubt leave to the ladies— and the bacilli.