LIFE SACRIFICED TO BEAUTY.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 4739, 2 September 1893, Page 3

LIFE SACRIFICED TO BEAUTY.

The arsenic habit among women 13 niore prevalent than is generally known, though according to the New York Sun it 1b no secret among physicians aad druggists that there are women who take every day enough of the poison to kill several men, for it is only among the fair aex tbat the habit ia found, and tbe French doctors call the victims arsenicomane (arsenic maniacs). The arsenic eaters experience none of the supreme exaltation of spirits known to the user of opium or alcohol. They slowly poison themselves for the sake of gaining a waxy, clear, unhealthy complexion, which to the uninitiated might seem beautiful.- This becomes more marked las they increase the fatal dose j gradually, and gain in plumpness on tho I tiny pille, which they take daily until a bottle containing enough arsenic for a week's treatment is consumed in a single I day. It is not an uncommon thing for ; young girls belonging to prominent j families to ask physicians for prescriptions containing the poisonous beautifier. Those more advanced in the habit buy the innocent-looking sweets imported from Madrid and sold only to those known to the sellers as arsenic eaters, for in each o£ the harmless-looking caramels there is enough, of the poißou to cause paralysis

and even death to the novica. The araenic victim professes her puffy., wasily fair skin and plump appearance to the laat> but she dice at forty. Kirely does one victim ; r«a.ch the age of forty-five before the fatal poison causes death.