POSTPONING THE DREAD SIGNS OF OLD AGE
Every woman is haunted by a specter, the dread ghost of old age. At
sixteen girls begin to dread it. At thirty-six women set traps for it.
At sixty they ward it off as best they may. I will tell you to-day what
are the marks of old age and how to remove them.
Women search their faces in the mirror for the first faint lines that
they fear may develop into wrinkles. The importance of these lines they
greatly exaggerate. For example, there are even on a baby’s neck two
parallel lines known to experts as “lines of beauty.” Others have named
them “the collar of Venus.” Women foolishly try to remove them, while
the truth is that if a woman does not have them she lacks a recognized
sign of beauty, and writes herself down to all beholders as so fat that
her flesh has swallowed up her Venus’s collar.
The infallible first sign of age is the sagging cheek muscles. These
are more serious and more difficult to treat than wrinkles. When, at
the merciless inspection of her face, which every wise woman gives
herself in the morning, a woman detects signs of these sagging muscles,
she must at once get to work upon them. The sagging muscles indicate
that they have grown too weak to remain in place, and they must be
assisted, strengthened. The way to strengthen them is to cause freer
circulation in those parts that are affected. And the way to stimulate
circulation is to massage the surfaces where circulation is desired.
But one must be very careful about the massage. Bad, that is,
unintelligent massage, is worse than none.
Study the drooping cheek muscles and you will notice that they are apt
to sag from the cheek over the edge of the lower jawbone, and try to
melt in an ungraceful way into the neck. This is not to be permitted.
The jawbone should keep its thin, fine edge to the end of life. The
nearer it is like a razor edge in sharpness the nearer you are to
keeping the facial line of youth. Some babes are born moon-faced and
moon-faced remain. But it is true, nevertheless, in the large majority
of cases, that if the lower edge of the jaw is of knife-like sharpness
the woman who possesses it is young. If it be muffled by flesh the
woman is old or is growing old.
Since the flesh is inclined to melt down into the chin, so forming the
double or triple chin, it is necessary to massage that surplus flesh.
Strengthen the muscles of the true or normal chin thus:
With a pure massage cream give one stroke to the muscles of the chin
with the right hand, then with the left, and so alternate. Pass the
hands from side to side, one under the other. When you have made twenty
such strokes give your attention to the cheek muscles proper. With the
tips of the first, second and third fingers rub slowly and gently, with
a rotary motion upward and backward along the line of the jaw, and
upward to the hair line. Repeat this operation again and again until
the cheek muscles and the fingers are weary. When they have rested
begin again, this time with the softer flesh above the jaw. Use the
first three fingers again and let the motion be backward and upward
again, but the pressure should be much lighter, for these muscles have
not the bony support of the lower ones, and it is always hazardous to
work other than skillfully on such muscles. For instance, the flesh
just beneath the eye should never be touched.
Twice a day is often enough for ordinary cases. But in extreme cases
ten minutes for massage four times a day is not too often.
Also let the woman whose cheek muscles are beginning to sag and who
by the same token is acquiring a double chin, remember to keep up her
head. Ordinarily a woman may turn to the flower for lessons in beauty.
In this instance she must look to the horse. How much handsomer is the
horse that carries his head high, and how much younger he looks!
Keep your head up while you are walking, while you are talking, even
while you are resting. Did you ever see a beauty, even when in repose,
allow her chin to sink upon her breast? Not while she is conscious. No,
no. When she is exhausted from a long walk or a dance she rests the
back of her head against the back of a lounging chair, but her chin is
always up, always. And this not only while she is awake, but while she
is asleep. Do not sleep upon a pillow if you can possibly rest without
it. Or, if you must have a pillow, let it be very small. And try to lie
on your back, with your chin up. That is the best position for health
and beauty.
And now about another particular sign-post of age. There is a saying
which persons always accompany by pointing to the delicate lines in
front of and extending below the lower portion of a woman’s ear: “That
is where a woman first shows her age.” In part that is true. There
is one extenuating fact. Some ears are set much closer to the head
than others. Those that are set well back and in draw the skin with a
drum-like tightness at the base of the ear. Lines never form about ears
so set. But if they grow well away from the head the skin about the ear
is loose and the lines are sure to come between thirty and forty. I
have seen them come about the ears of girls of nineteen. They too can
be removed by massage. Use the third finger of each hand and massage
with both hands at once, rubbing slowly, with gentle rotary motion
upward.
I have known some women to pin back the ears. So they call it; but it
consists merely in passing a band of white muslin around beneath the
nose and sloping upward about the upper lobes of the ear, thus pinning,
or pinioning them. This done for eight hours of every twenty-four, when
the person is asleep, should do a great deal toward smoothing away the
betraying little lines.
Another sign of age appears about the ears. There, as a rule, the hair
first begins to grow gray. It would be well to cut rather than pull
out these first gray hairs, for the hair pulled out usually means a
mutilation and irritation of the scalp in that part of the head. But if
they persist in growing I would recommend resignation--or dyeing. I do
not advocate hair dyes. The only substance I know that I believe is not
injurious is henna, which the Egyptians, who had wonderful hair, used.
But henna gives the hair a reddish cast. If my hair were growing gray
and thin about the ears and temples I would massage those parts often
with lanolin.
Dull eyes and dark circles under the eyes are believed to be one sign
of departing youth and vigor. Quite as often they are signs of impaired
health, of anæmia.
If you are anæmic, you should go to a reliable physician and get a
prescription for some good rebuilder. If this is not possible, give
yourself the good home treatment of plenty of sleep, of more than the
usual outdoor exercise, and of a diet of eggs, beets, spinach and
string beans, all those things which contain much iron.
For the woman who is beginning to “show her age” I prescribe much rest,
but never rest after a meal. She should rest before meals, say a siesta
of an hour and a half before luncheon and dinner, but not immediately
afterward. Rest after a meal induces flesh.
A sign of age is a dragging gait. The woman who wants to remain young
should repair the waste by more rest. When she is in the privacy of her
room she can completely relax. But for her in public there should be
no relaxation. Let her remember the tendency to this dragging and in
public be as truly on parade as a soldier at guard drill.
Also in the older woman we note bent shoulders. They should be
straightened. Best of all by massage. A long, full stroke over the
shoulders with the palms of the hands, meeting at a point between the
shoulder blades. If massage did not cure I should try the shoulder and
back braces sold at pharmacists’.
But massage with pure cold cream, tested and analyzed by a chemist, is
the best friend of the older as well as the younger woman who wishes to
be beautiful. This is excellent for oily skins:
One ounce tincture of benzoin; two drams tincture of musk; four drams
tincture of ambergris; five ounces rectified spirits; one and one-half
pints orange flower water.
This I recommend especially for delicate skins easily roughened by the
wind:
Three ounces almond oil; five drams white wax; five drams of
spermaceti; one dram oil of bitter almonds; three ounces elder flower
water; one ounce witch hazel.
This, a simpler cream, is wholesome and efficacious:
Four ounces almond oil; four ounces rosewater; one ounce spermaceti;
one ounce white wax.
This is an excellent preparation also for an oily skin:
Six ounces orange flower water, triple extract; one ounce deodorized
alcohol; one ounce blanched bitter almonds; one dram white wax; one
dram spermaceti; one dram oil of benne; twelve drops oil of bergamot;
six drops oil of cloves; six drops oil of bigarade; one-quarter ounce
borax.
This is an excellent massage cream, having cleansing properties:
Three ounces oil of sweet almonds; two drams balsam of tolu; ten drams
oil of bitter almonds; two drams benzoin; two drops essence of lemon;
two drops essence of cajeput.
An exquisite cream, much used by those who are fastidious, is this:
Four ounces oil of sweet almonds; six drams white wax; six drams
spermaceti; two drams borax; one ounce glycerine; five drops oil of
neroli; fifteen drops oil of bigarade (extracted from orange skin);
fifteen drops oil of petit grain.
Some women of the old school prefer a liquid preparation to a cream.
One of these was the beautiful Queen Elizabeth of Hungary. Her
complexion was once the toast of Europe, and this when she had reached
a very advanced age. I have used this modification of her favorite
lotion for the face:
One-half ounce oil of rosemary; two drams oil of lavender; thirty
grains oil of petit grain; three drams tincture of tolu; one-half pint
orange flower water; five ounces rectified spirits.
Let us consider first the cause of wrinkles. The causes, rather, should
I say, for the sources of wrinkles are five. They are: Age, worry,
weariness, the bad habit of making faces, and the shrinking of the
flesh away from the skin.
We cannot arrest age, the process of growing old, but we can conceal
for a long time the fact of age. I believe it is quite possible for
a woman to say, “From this moment I shall not appear to grow older,”
and to achieve that end. I have known women who have seemed to stop
short the revolutions in the wheels of time for twenty years. Others I
have known who by a new regimen, or by changing their mental attitude
toward life, accustoming themselves to that most wonderful of all
rejuvenators, taking a more cheerful view, have seemed to grow five or
ten years younger.
Age is not an inevitable creator of wrinkles. It merely deepens the
tracks made by our thoughts, wearing them deeper and deeper with the
years as the wheels of a wagon cut deeper and deeper into the clay of a
country road. It is to be seen then that prevention is a large part of
the treatment of wrinkles. To cure wrinkles first look to it that you
do not acquire them.
Worry is another foe of the childlike smoothness of skin that is one
of the most desirable states of beauty. The outward and visible signs
of inward worry appear chiefly in two areas, in the diagonal lines
extending from the nostrils to the lips, and in the forehead where they
create what a precocious child, studying his mother’s face, called
“gutters for the tears.” These lines are interesting as indicators
of character. The woman with deep lines about her lips has greater
determination and passion. She has a more intense emotional nature. The
woman with the strongly marked horizontal lines in the forehead is more
intellectual. Her anxieties are mental, while those of the woman with
the parentheses are temperamental. To the woman with the ever growing
deeper tracery on her forehead I should say, “Don’t fret.” The woman
with the fast deepening parentheses I advise, “Don’t care.” Consider
these bits of advice. The distinction is illuminative.
The accustomed eye sees readily the characters written by fatigue. They
are rather creases than wrinkles, deep folds in the skin, as though the
covering of the muscles had grown weary and limp, and was resting from
its task of smoothly fitting over the muscles. They are perhaps the
most disfiguring of the wrinkles and the hardest to remove.
[Illustration: KITTY GORDON Her arms, neck and shoulders furnish an
ideal which every woman should try to attain.]
The bad habit of making faces--I shrink appalled from my task of
preventing this, or of counseling how to remove its traces. Some women,
especially American women, have yielded to the ugly habit thinking that
the lines that follow it are the price one must pay for her vivacity.
But they are mistaken, hopelessly, fatally mistaken. One of the most
vivacious faces I have known is that of a beautiful French woman. Her
face is like a mirror, but the eyes and mouth are the only reflectors.
She does not draw the mouth down at one corner or the other while she
talks. She does not raise her eyebrows until they threaten to become
lost in her hair, puckering the skin at the corners of the eyes as
though there were a drawing string beneath them. She does not prove her
concentration upon a topic of conversation by creating deep horizontal
lines in the forehead above and between the eyes. She does not laugh so
violently that the flesh breaks up into ripples and eddies about the
eyes. She makes her glowing eyes and her smiling lips express all her
thought and emotion. So did all the French beauties of old, which was
the reason that Ninon L’Enclos and Mme. Recamier, in their extreme age,
had lovers and no wrinkles.
The shrinking away of the muscles from the skin is a serious menace
to beauty. Its causes are several. Perhaps a woman has reduced her
flesh more suddenly than wisely. Perhaps the shrinkage has been caused
by anæmia. The condition demands nourishment of the skin and of the
muscles beneath the skin. But this is merely a local treatment. More
than anything else it requires a rebuilding and rejuvenation of the
entire system.
Knowing the causes we must avoid them. We must resolve to conceal if we
cannot stop the ageing process. We must not, dare not, worry. We must
never pass a certain point of fatigue, that point at which we are too
tired to rest or sleep. Such a weariness is destructive. We must not
make faces while we talk. Whatever our emotions we must try to keep our
features serene as those of a mask. Leave to the mouth and eyes the
task of expression. We must by nourishing both skin and muscles prevent
their divorcing each other.
But granted that the wrinkles have appeared what shall we do to remove
them? We must first remove the cause which has produced them. If two
ugly parallel lines are discernible between the eyebrows we must
correct that habit of scowling, whose footprints are ugliness. And
we must avoid eye-strain. Often the lines in their beginning can be
removed by giving up the habit of reading except by daylight, and then
of not reading long continuously.
A young woman who, after much travel, noticed a light but ominous
tracery of delicate lines on her face, said: “Heavens! I must take the
rest cure, and buy cold cream by the pound!” She was right. Those first
menacing wrinkles showed that she had not preserved the balance of
vitality which assures perfect health. She had given out her strength
faster than she renewed it. The outgo exceeded the inflow, which is
merely over exertion, differently phrased. She went to bed and remained
there for three days. In her darkened room sleep, the great ironer
out of lines, aided by the generous and frequent applications of cold
cream, removed her wrinkles. When she came forth from her rest cure
her skin was smooth and as delicately flushed with pink as that of a
healthy babe.
The cold cream which she had bought “by the pound” was one of the best
to be obtained in the market or to be frugally made at home:
Spermaceti, ½ ounce; white wax, ½ ounce; oil of sweet almonds, 2
ounces; lanolin, 1 ounce; cocoanut oil, 1 ounce; tincture of benzoin,
12 drops; orange flower water, 1 ounce.
She might have used, as effectively, this which has an astringent
quality, while the former is essentially a skin food:
Almond milk, 1½ ounces; rose water, 6 ounces; alum, 60 grains.
This relic of the customs of old France is another aid in the removal
of crow’s-feet or other paths of age:
Honey, 3 ounces; isinglass, 1½ ounces; pure vinegar, preferably that
made from white wine, 1 pint; shredded red sandal wood, ½ dram.
A deliciously refreshing pomade classed with the wrinkle removers is
composed of:
White wax, 30 grams; honey, 15 grams; juice of lily bulbs, 60 grams;
rose water, 12 grams.
This is a liquid preparation which the beauties of the Austrian court
named in their gratitude “The Water of Eternal Youth”:
Pulverized sweet almonds, 48 grains; pulverized gum arabic, 32 grains;
pulverized benzoin, 32 grains; pulverized olibanum incense, 32 grains;
alcohol, 8 ounces; cloves finely ground, 16 grains.
The face should be washed with this as often as convenient, and the
preparation can be applied by wetting freely bandages of cheese cloth
or bolting cloth or old silk or muslin, tied about the chin or forehead.
Of course these must be applied by careful and skillful massage, the
lines about the lips removed by a rotary motion of the second and third
fingers of each hand, rubbing upward toward the nose. The lines about
the eyes should be massaged in the same way, away from the corners of
the eyes and toward the hair line. The lines between the brows should
be ironed away by a pressure of the fingers between the brows and
sweeping away above the eyebrows to the point where the eyebrows end.
So for the horizontal lines of the brow the rotary motion of the first
three fingers upward toward the hair. Afterward all this surface should
be gone over carefully with the light, tapping motion which I have
before described as being like the patter of rain.
The woman who has reduced her flesh rapidly may find the skin about
the cheeks sagging into deep folds when she bends her head. These can
be corrected by three methods, all of which I recommend to be used for
that condition. First she must cultivate as a habit that poise of the
head which is infinitely useful in removing a double chin. She must
keep the chin and head tilted upward, the most graceful and becoming
poise of the head for all women. She should massage the muscles with
the first three fingers, following the muscles backward toward the
lines of the ears. For the wee wrinkles that form in front of the ears
massage with the second finger, in rotary motion, gently back toward
the ear.
For obstinate wrinkles on the forehead adhesive plaster may be cut into
strips and pasted across the wrinkled surface after the skin has been
drawn taut into place by the thumb and forefinger.
A home remedy is a compress of old linen or muslin dipped into a
mixture of the white of an egg and a gill of alcohol. Press the loose
skin back into place as I have directed and apply the compress.
Dryness of the skin will cause wrinkles. To understand this study two
rose leaves, one moist and full veined and nourished, the other drying
and forming fine lines. The dry skin wrinkles sooner and deeper than
the oily skin. Wrinkles are chiefly formed by the skin ceasing to
fit well over the muscles which it protects. This may be because the
muscles shrink or because the skin loses its firmness, or both.
Try to avoid wrinkles by keeping your face placid. The nervous
person has more wrinkles and forms them earlier than the one of more
self-controlled nature. Don’t half close your eyes when you laugh. That
habit causes wrinkles. Don’t let your mouth droop when you are angry or
troubled. That carves deep lines about your lips, making the dreaded
parentheses. Don’t wrinkle your brow when you talk or listen, to prove
your veracity or interest. It is a habit that carves transverse lines
on the brow.
When they begin to appear take more rest. Plenty of sleep is the
greatest ironer out of wrinkles. Correct the bad habits that have
caused them. Live simply. Nothing brings wrinkles sooner than
dissipation and late hours.
When small, fine lines begin to appear, putting cold cream well into
the affected area should help to drive them away. Ironing that portion
of the face with small lumps of ice covered with cotton or gauze is a
good remedy if you persist in it.
A method in general use in the beauty parlors of Paris, and that has
been introduced recently in this country, is to spray the wrinkle area
with cool or cold water. If you have not a wrinkle spray, a large
perfume atomizer will serve the same end.
When your skin seems loose and inclined to form into folds use one of
the following remedies:
Dip a bit of absorbent cotton into glycerine and pat it well into the
wrinkle bed. Or apply cologne water in the same way. In a short time
you can decide which is the better adapted to your skin. Glycerine,
while a food and stimulant to some skins, is an irritant to others.
A nightly bath of the face in buttermilk sometimes tightens up the
loosened skin.
This is a method much in use in Paris and Rome. Hundreds of years old,
traced even to the time of Cleopatra, it is still effective, it is
claimed, in keeping the countenance smooth and youthful. Heat a shovel
red hot in the fire. Throw upon it when so heated a handful of powdered
myrrh. Bend the face over it to receive the fumes, such fumes as can
penetrate the napkin that has been spread over the face. Do this two
or three times at the same treatment. Heating the shovel once more,
pour white wine over it and, still through the moistened napkin which
protects the face from the heat of the fire, receive the fumes in the
face. A fortnight of two such treatments given daily is the recipe a
woman whose face is smooth as a girl’s, though this famous Parisienne
is now sixty, gave me for my American readers.
A simpler remedy is to boil a small handful of pearl barley in half a
pint of water until it is thoroughly cooked. Add a half dozen drops
of mecca balsam. Place in a stone bottle and shake thoroughly before
using. Bathe the face in this once a day.
These astringent lotions may also be applied with benefit:
Water, 1 quart; pearl barley, 2 handfuls. Boil until the barley grains
are soft. Strain the liquor and add 50 drops of tincture of benzoin.
Wash the face, if possible, a dozen times a day with this:
Oil of rosemary, ½ ounce; oil of lavender, 2 drams; tincture of tolu, 4
drams; rosewater, 1 pint; rectified spirits of wine, 1½ pints; oil of
petit grain, 30 drops.
Believe me, if the spirit remains young, the flesh will age but
slowly. Contrive to keep interested in persons and conditions and
circumstances. Don’t let yourself be bored. Flee from bores or drive
them from you.
When you are uninterested, your face grows heavy and opaque. It loses
its reflective power, that mirror-like quality which is its chief
charm. One of the wisest and most enchanting women I ever knew--truly a
woman irresistible--told me she would never allow any one to see her in
any but her sunniest mood.
“Meeting people is making pictures of one’s self,” she said. “Memory
pictures that remain long, perhaps forever, in their minds. It is
difficult, sometimes impossible, to remove that memory picture. They
may see us in other moods and phases, but the ugly picture persists. If
I am in an unbecoming mood, I hide until it is past, as I would hide
did I suffer from an infectious disease.”
That is true philosophy of charm. Be interested, be cheerful, be at
your best when you are in public. If you cannot be these, hide from the
sight of men and women until the eclipse of your charming self has
passed. If you are a business and professional woman and cannot do so,
at least hide the mood beneath an impassive face and behind the screen
of a silent tongue.
Two extreme evidences of the approach of age are certain conditions
of the head and feet. Don’t let the lower part of your face grow
heavy. That adds to the appearance of age. “Jowl-like” cheeks and a
loose-hanging chin add years to apparent age. Prevent that defect, or,
if it has appeared, correct it by great care.
Be vigilant as a worthy policeman. Be on the alert. Say to yourself,
“Am I holding my head high? Am I giving the muscles of my chin exercise
to keep them firm, or am I allowing the flesh to accumulate and form a
bag about it?”
As many times a day as you can, and at least every morning and evening,
give the neck and chin their stretching exercises. Raise the chin and
let the head fall back upon the shoulders. Let it rest as far back as
possible, and with the tips of the fingers press gently upward the
muscles at the sides of the neck. Persuade those muscles. Train them.
In time they will respond to the education you are giving them and grow
firmer.
If, at the same time, you iron the falling muscles of the chin and neck
with a piece of ice the process of rebuilding the lower part of the
face will be quicker. But I have found very effective retiring with a
piece of soft cloth, saturated in witch hazel, pressed about my neck.
Witch hazel is an astringent and will draw the flaccid skin tighter.
No matter how tired you are, don’t allow yourself to look tired.
The tired lines and slipping downward muscles add greatly to your
appearance of age. Control them. It can be done by an exercise of the
will. Smile. Most women look better when smiling, and all, who have
well kept teeth, look younger.
I said you must look to your feet. That is true. If you have worn shoes
that give you a silly, mincing gait, buy larger ones and acquire a
free, natural, springing walk. Don’t drag your feet about as though
they and your body had a weight you could scarcely bear. Lift your feet
and walk with the fine spring and swing of youth. This, too, is a habit
that can be formed even at an advanced age. Perhaps you have had the
slow, heavy step of age from your childhood. Then it is high time to
change it--if you would be young.
Study the faces about you and you will see that some of them are firm
muscled, full and of even contour. In others you see that the muscles
are sagging, slipping from place. The face is growing heavier about the
chin and there is a drawn, strained look of the muscles about the eyes
and temples. These are the fallen faces.
If you see that the muscles of your face are beginning to slip downward
lose no time in counteracting this tendency to make the visage look
older and heavier. Had I my choice between wrinkles and the regrettable
fallen face I should choose the wrinkles as less ageing in appearance
and more likely to be remedied.
First, reform your habits of sleeping. The posture in which we sleep
determines into what lines the face and body fall for eight or nine
hours of each twenty-four--a third or more of our time. If correct
habits are formed for that time there is an admirable start on the road
to better looks.
Notice how your head rests as you fall asleep. Perhaps it is bent far
forward. In that case the facial muscles are relaxed and their tendency
is to slip downward, tugging their weight, especially that of the large
chin and cheek muscles, drawing them down throughout the night. All
muscles relax while we are asleep. That is the reason why, on rising
in the morning, the face looks heavy and “pudgy.” The muscles do not
recover their tone until the habits of the day reassert themselves.
With this knowledge you should be willing to make special effort and
endure some inconvenience to prevent this slipping of the facial
muscles at night. Toss away your pillow, or, if you are exceedingly
uncomfortable without one, if the blood rushes to the head and causes
you to be sleepless, use a small, flat pillow, or better still, slip
such a pillow beneath the head of the mattress so that your body will
rest at a slight incline, and the hair and scalp will be spared the
heating of the pillow. Lie upon your back. In this posture your chin
will be thrust upward and the muscles will be at tension. If you sleep
thus the facial muscles will not sag during the night hours.
Study your habits during the day and correct such habits as cause a
falling of the facial muscles. Perhaps you bend your head unnecessarily
low over your work. If so avoid this. At any rate, give the chin
muscles the opposite exercise by bending the head backward upon the
shoulders many times a day.
Perhaps you have formed the habit picturesquely described as “talking
into your chest.” This is an unbecoming mannerism of many women.
Shyness or self-consciousness or listlessness may be the cause in some
instances. In others it is sheer bodily laziness. Don’t let your chin
sink upon your chest when you talk, nor at any other time. It makes a
very unpleasant impression upon the hearer. It gives him the idea that
you are secretive or deceitful. Lift your head when you talk, and look
into the face of the person you are addressing. He or she will admire
you more. Besides it is another means of preventing the slipping of the
facial muscles, of keeping your face from falling.
We go back to nature for inspiration for beauty. Some of the most
graceful of the modern dancers are self-taught and nature-taught,
taking for models of grace the swaying of the tree boughs and the
lilt of flowers in a wind. So we can go back to nature for models in
the poise of the head. Take for an example, not some tired dray horse
who lets his discouraged muscles sink beneath his forelegs, but the
inquisitive bird, with head uplifted and upturned eyes seeking to solve
the mystery of the trees.
Coax the muscles of the chin and neck into obedience. Beginning at the
point where the muscles of the neck meet those of the shoulders, press
firmly with the fingers of both hands, moving the hands upward to the
muscles of the lower jaw and continuing the pressure on the muscles
behind the ears.
Is your neck beginning to look old? Is the skin growing flabby? Are the
muscles sagging? Is the skin looking yellow? Is it no longer a source
of pride and pleasure to wear a V-shaped or low cut gown?
Do not despair, for the ageing neck is not an infallible sign of
growing old. It is only one of them. And you have my assurance that
you can make it look youthful again. For proof of this let me point
you to the great singing teachers, yes, and the great singers who are
their pupils. Almost every one of them--indeed, I can think of no
exception--has a round, white, youthful-looking throat. One of the most
beautiful necks I ever saw, white, strong, girlish, was that of the
celebrated vocal teacher, Mme. Marchesi, when she was seventy.
But while this is true, it is also true that you should begin giving
the neck special attention before you are thirty. It were better if you
began when you were twenty-five.
First, look to its careful feeding. Give it at least one good meal a
day by rubbing cold cream liberally into the front of the neck at night
before retiring.
Look very carefully to the poise of the head. If the head be held
proudly, the chin up, the muscles of the neck will also be held firm.
But if you permit the head to droop the neck muscles share the sagging.
Never lie with the head high. One small pillow is enough for anyone,
except the insomniac. If you can dispense with the small, flat pillow
and lie with the head and feet on a level, so much the better for the
neck.
The neck thus trained, and with the additional training of deep
breathing, learned by vocal lessons, should never grow old. I advise
every woman to take vocal culture for herself, even though she have no
liking for music, simply for the sake of the beauty of her neck. The
most beautiful necks in the world are those of singers.
But if these preventive measures have been neglected and the neck is
losing its roundness and its firm aspect, have recourse to that great
body builder, massage. There is special massage for the neck, and it
must be intelligently given.
First strengthen the chin muscles by pressing firmly upon them with the
backs of the hands. Turn the hands, with the backs upward, and letting
the finger tips meet beneath the middle of the chin. Press with all
your strength on the muscles of the chin, working backward and upward
behind the ears to the hair line.
Second. With the tips of the fingers quite meeting at the point of the
collar bone in front, draw the hands with long, slow strokes upward to
a point beneath the ears. This is a good muscle building movement.
Third. Slap the neck smartly with the palms.
Fourth. “Lift” the tendons at the side of the neck that are inclined
to grow more prominent and ropey each year. This lifting consists in
seizing the tendons in a firm grasp and seeming to raise them to meet
the head. This is painful, and may even cause a slight headache at
first, but these are only Nature’s protests against the unaccustomed.
Even Nature is an old fogey about innovations.
Fifth. Grasp the large muscles at the back of the neck and connecting
the shoulders, and “lift” these also. Raise them as though it were your
purpose to place them in the curve of the neck. This should be followed
by a vigorous kneading of the muscles.
The aim of all these massage movements is to promote circulation in
the neck. The yellowish, withered-looking skin denotes that the blood
flows weakly in that part of the body. The flabby muscles indicate that
the muscles have not been well exercised. A good developing exercise
for the neck is to let the head lie back as far as possible on the
shoulders, then roll slowly from one shoulder to the other.
The hands should be immersed in nourishing cold cream before “feeding”
the throat muscles. This is a formula for a nutritious cream:
Almond oil, 1½ ounces; lanolin, ½ ounce; spermaceti, ½ ounce; witch
hazel, ½ ounce; tincture of benzoin, ½ dram.
Ninon de L’Enclos, one of the greatest beauties of French history, had
a beautiful neck, and to her is accredited the use of this neck food:
Rosewater, 8 ounces; almond oil, 8 ounces; tincture of benzoin, ¼
ounce; attar of rose, 5 drops.
This will be quite as efficacious and much less expensive without the
attar of rose.
The following nourishes and whitens the skin of the neck:
Honey, 1 tablespoonful; lemon juice, 1 teaspoonful; whites of two eggs;
enough bran or almond meal to make a fine paste.
This wash is also a good neck bleach, particularly useful in removing
the dark stains or rings caused by wearing the prevalent gilt and
silver trimmings about the throat:
Hydrochloric acid, ¼ ounce; water, 5 ounces.
Avoid high, tight collars. Wear soft white silk and muslin linings next
the throat for colored collars. If it is necessary to wear costumes
with high collars on the street, change them at once for collarless
gowns when you are at home. If you wear chains or dog collars about the
neck let them be loose.
A famous theatrical manager whose duty it had been to select thousands
of beauties for the choruses of his productions, and who was a
celebrated connoisseur of feminine beauty said that a neck to be
beautiful must look as though it “belonged” to the body, that is, to
use theatrical parlance, it must “be in the picture.” A long neck on
a short woman is absurd, and a short neck on a tall woman makes her
look like a freak of nature. If a girl is slender her neck should be
slim, but she should take measures to prevent its being “scrawny.” If
a neck is full and round, to correspond with the body of the owner, it
is as nature designed it to be. A full, well rounded neck is not only
beautiful in itself, but it is a sign of abundant vitality. The same
theatrical manager I have before quoted said he cared not how thin a
neck was if it matched the body and was well “covered.” He meant if
the outlines of the bones and sinews were well hidden by a delicate
covering of flesh. Usually if the neck is very thin the entire body is
also, and measures should be taken to upbuild the constitution. Eating
nourishing food, breathing deeply and giving the body plenty of rest,
should fill out the hollows in the neck as well as the body.
This process can be hastened by patting into it nightly an emollient
made of equal parts of almond oil and vaseline. Also the neck muscles
can be strengthened by placing upon the head now and then a moderate
weight, as a book, and walking slowly about the room, balancing the
book by so steadying the head that the book will not fall. If the neck
be disproportionately fat gentle pinching between the thumb and first
three fingers should reduce its bulk.