464 



NA TURE 



[April II. 1872 



Lawson Tait 



ONE SOURCE OF SKIN DISEASES 



OBSCURE affections of the skin of the face of men 

 especially are well known to specialists to be widely 

 spread. They aie commonly classed as ckzciiia, and 

 while causing great discomfort especially at night, show 

 nothing, or almost nothing, to the eye, if the pa'ient be 

 otherwise in pretty good health. Skin specialists fre- 

 quently ask patients whether they have been using any ne-*' 

 sort of soap, but no one seems hitherto to have traced any 

 distinct communication between soap and this trouble- 

 some disease. 



As I have been able pretty distinctly to do so in refer- 

 ence to myself, probably a brief notice of the facts may 

 not be out of place in Nature, where it is likely to 

 be of more popular benefit than if committed to the pages 

 of a medical journal, in which the inferences of " mere 

 laymen" are not greatly reputed. It is a fact but very 

 little known to the multitude of both sexes who use thi 

 "Prime Old Brown Windsor Soap" of the perfumers' 

 shops, that by far the largest proportion of it is manu- 

 factured from "bone -grease." Few more beautiful 

 examples of chemical transformation are to be found 

 in the whole range of chemical manufacture than this 

 one. At one end of a long range of buildings we find a 

 huge shed heaped up with bones, usually such as are of 

 little value to the bone- turner or brush-maker, in all 

 stages of putrefaction as to the adherent or inherent 

 portions of softer animal matter attached to them, the 

 odour of which is insupportable. 



These are crushed and ground to a coarse powder, ex- 

 posed to the action of boiling water under pressure, some- 

 times of steam, until the grease and marrow are ex- 

 tracted. 



We need not here pursue the subsequent treatment of 

 the rest of the material from which bone glue and 

 "patent isinglass" are prepared, the latter of which we 

 often eat in the soups and jellies of the pastrycooks, and 

 finally to the " bone dust," or phosphate of lime, nearly free 

 from animal matter, which is produced for the use of the 

 assayer and the china manufacturer, &c., as well as for 

 other purposes in the arts. 



But let us follow up the bone-grease, which is of a dark 

 tarry brown colour, and of an abominable odour. 



By various processes it is more or less defalcated, 

 bleached, and deodorised, and is separated into two or 

 thrtc different qualities, the most inferior of which goes 

 to the formation of railway or other machinery greases, 

 and the latter is saponified, and becomes, when well manu- 

 factured, a hard brown soap, still, however, retaining an 



unplcasint smell. It is now, after being remelted, 

 strongly perfumed, so that, like the clothes and persons 

 of the magnates of the Middle Ages, its own evil odour 

 is hidden by the artificiil perfume. 



This is the " Fine Old Erown Windsor Soap" of most 

 of our shops. The natural brown colo'ir of the grease 

 gives it the right tint in the cheapest way, without the 

 colouring by caramel, which was the original method of 

 manufacture. 



Like all other things, there are cheap and dear Wind- 

 sor soaps ; and for the production of the former liule is 

 done beyond saponifying and casting into blocks or bars. 

 Were we to rely upon the many experiments that have 

 been made as to the degr.?e of elevation of temperature 

 at which putrescent or other contagious matter is de- 

 prived of its morbific power, we might conclude that 

 boiling and saponifying had made this hitherto putrescent 

 grease innocuous. 



It seems, however, more than doubtful that such is the 

 fact in this case, for the siap thus made seems to be 

 capable of communicating skin diseases when rubbed on 

 the face for use in shaving. 



But another promoter of irritation is not unfrequently 

 also found. Whether it be that it is more profitable 

 to the soapmaker to have a liberal proportion of the fin'.'r 

 particles of the ground bone made up with the soap, or 

 that these are difficult to separate coiiipletcly, the fact 

 is that bars of this "Brown Windsor Soap'' are to be 

 bought containing a rich mixture of those small sharp 

 angular fragments of bone which before boiling was putrid. 

 When a piece of such soap is rubbed hard to a man's face, 

 the skin is more or less cut and scored by these bony p.\.r- 

 ticles held in the soap like emery in ahead 'Map," and 

 thus the skin is placed in the most favourable state to 

 absorb whatever there may be of irritant, or contagious, 

 or putrid in the soap itself. The existence of the bone 

 fragments is easily verified by solution of the soap in 

 water or alcohol, and examination of the undissolved par- 

 ticles with a lens; and I can readily, if need be, send you 

 a piece of such soap for examination. 



Now, without occupying too much of your space, I may 

 just state that 1 have while using such shaving soap thrice 

 suffered froni ekzema of the fact\ On the first occasion 

 I derived no benefit from treatment by the two most cele- 

 brated dermal surgeons in London, and at la^t the disease 

 went away of itself after giving up shaving for a time. I 

 had by me a quantity of this brown soap, and through 

 inadvertence took to using it again, for a time without 

 effect ; but when dry and hot weather came, with it came a 

 recurrence of the skin disease,which also again, after some 

 months of discomfort, went away. Curious to make sure 



