SKIN. 



W. E. WATT. 



One said he wondered that lether was not dearer than any other thing-. Being 

 demanded a reason: because, saith he, it is more stood upon than any other thing- in the 

 world. — Hazlitt. 



What! is the jay more precious than the lark, 

 Because his feathers are more beautiful? 



Or is the adder better than the eel, 



Because his painted skin contents the eye? 



-Shakespeare. 



ft GILDED live pig is a sight 

 rarely seen. The rarity of 

 putting gold leaf all over a 

 living animal of any kind 

 comes from the fact that the animal 

 dies so soon after the operation. It 

 has been tried several times and always 

 with the same result. 



The idea arose from an experiment 

 unfortunately performed upon a child 

 on the accession of Leo X. to the papal 

 chair. The child was gilded all over 

 to represent the Golden Age. The 

 people of Florence were delighted with 

 the idea, but the death of the child 

 took place so quickly that some 

 thought the brief duration -of the 

 Golden Age was miraculously repre- 

 sented as well as its great glory. 



The experiment has never been re- 

 peated upon a human subject, but men 

 of science cautiously tried to find out 

 the secret of the child's living but a 

 few hours after the operation, and so 

 gilded pigs and varnished rabbits and 

 other small animals. From such tests 

 of the value of an open skin to animal 

 life they found that all things that have 

 breath must have open skin pores in 

 order to maintain life. 



Closing the pores of the skin causes 

 the temperature to fall directly and 

 the heart and lungs become gorged 

 with blood. The circulation of the 

 blood is seriously interfered with and 

 death follows with the usual symptoms 

 of asphyxiation. 



Strange as it seemed to those who 

 first witnessed such experiments, the 

 life of an animal is more directly de- 

 pendent upon the action of the skin 

 than upon that of the stomach, the 

 liver, or even the brain. Monstrosities 

 have been born without brains; but 

 they have frequently lived for some 



time, taking their food regularly and 

 having the appearance of as much com- 

 fort as others of their kind with brains. 

 They died early, but their life was uni- 

 formly longer than the time which 

 elapsed after the application of a coat- 

 ing which stopped the skin of other 

 animals until death ensued. 



A man will live much longer without 

 stomach action than without the proper 

 functions of the skin. In fact, the 

 skin may take the place of the stomach 

 in sustaining life for awhile, where the 

 act of swallowing has been prevented 

 by disease or accident. Feeding the 

 patient through the skin has been ac- 

 complished with varying degrees of 

 success. A bath of warm water or 

 milk and water assuages thirst. Sail- 

 ors deprived of fresh water wet their 

 clothes with salt water, and the ab- 

 sorption of moisture sustains them 

 where salt water taken into the stomach 

 might have resulted fatally. 



The health of the skin is closely con- 

 nected with that of the whole system. 

 Its appearance and condition as to 

 moisture and dryness, as well as its 

 temperature and color are regularly 

 examined when the system is out of 

 order. Since the skin is so important 

 to the general health and its condition 

 is placed so completely within our con- 

 trol, it is wise to care for it judi- 

 ciously. We often find other organs 

 of the body in an unsound condition 

 and begin to doctor them when the 

 whole trouble has arisen from bad 

 treatment of the skin. The skin needs 

 more care than the liver or the stomach, 

 and many of the troubles laid at the 

 door of one or both these organs may 

 be avoided by proper care of the one 

 organ over which we have entire con- 

 trol, the skin. Where the skin is pre- 



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