Having considered thus briefly the matter of food and its relation to
health, the question of clothing and personal hygiene now rises for
attention. Besides serving for covering and adornment and guarding the
body from injury, the use of clothing is to help in preserving the
proper animal heat in spite of external changes. In health the normal
temperature of the body, ninety-eight to ninety-nine degrees Fahrenheit,
is invariable. In order that this temperature shall be maintained with
the least strain on the vitality, the clothing should be such that heat
is not readily conducted to or from the body.
Cotton and linen keep off the direct rays of the sun and favor the loss
of heat from the body, but being bad absorbers of moisture they are apt
to interfere with evaporation from the skin, and cause dangerous chills.
Linen and cotton are good conductors of heat, especially the former, and
do not readily absorb moisture. Silk and wool are bad conductors. Wool
has also a remarkable power of so completely absorbing moisture that it
feels dry when cotton or linen would be wet and cold. Its value as a
non-conductor, retaining internal heat and excluding external heat, is
shown by the fact that we wrap ice in blankets to keep it from melting,
and cover teapots with woolen “cosies” to keep them from getting cold.
These qualities together render it the most perfect material for
clothing under all conceivable circumstances.
The young and the old, the rheumatic, all persons liable to colds or
weak in lungs, or who have suffered from kidney diseases, those who are
exposed to great heat or cold or are engaged in laborious exercises,
ought to wear woolen next to the skin and, indeed, everyone would be
better for doing so. Rheumatic persons and those liable to cold feet
will find it a great luxury to sleep in blankets in winter instead of
sheets, and young children who are apt to get uncovered at night should
wear flannel night-gowns next the skin in the winter and over cotton
ones in the summer.
The color of clothing is a matter of little importance in the shade, but
in the sun the best reflectors are coolest, such as white and light
grays, while blue and black are the worst, absorbing the most heat. Dark
colors also absorb odors more than light colors do. Indeed, for
every-day use light-colored garments of whatever material, provided it
can be washed, are to be recommended, though dark colors are too often
preferred because they do not show the dirt. What woman would like to
wear a cotton waist and skirt six months without washing? Yet it would
not be half so dirty as the more absorbent dark woolen dress that she
would wear as long without a scruple.
Beds and bedding are likewise elements of importance in the general
health, although not always sufficiently considered. Soft, and
especially feather, beds are weakening. The harder a bed, consistent
with comfort, the better. Good hair mattresses are the most wholesome.
Coverings should be light, porous enough to carry off the evaporations
from the body, and yet bad conductors of heat. Most blankets are too
heavy, and thick cotton counterpanes are heavy without being warm.
Flannel night-dresses are much preferred to cotton at all times, both
for comfort and for health. Warmer in winter, they obviate the chill of
the cold sheets; while in summer they prevent the more dangerous chill
when in the early morning hours the external temperature falls, when the
production of internal heat in the body is at its lowest ebb and the
skin perhaps bathed in perspiration—a chill which otherwise can be
avoided only by an unnecessary amount of bed clothes.