Chapter 5

Ripe fruits, served upon green leaves, are always appetizing, even if there is nothing more than toast or rolls to go with them. Cereals, such as rice, barley or hominy (they must be steamed for hours), served with rich cream, make ideal luncheons. A baked apple, a bit of rice pudding, or a custard--they, too, are worth the while and the price. Eggs, either boiled or carefully scrambled, or made into an omelet, flavored with a dash of parsley, and chops or fish delicately broiled, are substantial viands. Soups or broths, breads, fruits and an occasional salad make desirable luncheons. A noonday meal of creamed potatoes and green peas is not to be despised, and it's a godsend to the poor stomach that has been heroically tussling with cocoanut pudding, fruit cake and chocolate rich enough to own a castle in Europe. Such dishes as Italian spaghetti, with tomato sauce and Parmesan cheese, or celery or cress salad, with no other dressing than the best olive oil and a teaspoonful of vinegar, will do very well.

There is no economy in buying badly cooked luncheons. Seek quality, not quantity, and, so far as health and good looks go, you'll find yourself getting along famously.

Rich foods, especially pastries, can bring forth an array of facial eruptions that is positively maddening to the poor victim. Ice cream soda, too, deranges the stomach and creates all sorts of disagreeable disturbances. Hot bread and rolls, indulged in to an appalling extent in southern households, can do more real damage to a good, fair skin than all the winds and wintry blasts that ever shook chimneys or swept friskily around corners and alleyways.

Overeating not only brings indigestion and creepy dreams, but invariably makes the complexion coarse, high-colored and overruddy. That does not mean that one should nibble at things and not demolish a "good square meal." Eating should be understood--rules laid down and religiously carried out.

Usually hygienic dishes and health foods comprise a complete list of one's special horrors. Most girls who have tried them say so. But just the same, there are dozens--yes, hundreds--of nutritious viands that are decidedly more palatable and appetizing than the sweets and indigestible doughy nothings that not only make of you a physical wreck but set you to wishing most heartily that the man who invented mirrors had died of the measles in his early infancy.

Rice is a good old stand-by as a builder-up of a run-down constitution. But you don't like it? Well, then, stew it with chicken sometime and you will soon discover what great possibilities are in this despised grain. Oatmeal, as it is usually cooked, is a thing of horror, to be shunned and avoided and run away from. But oatmeal left to slowly simmer for a full hour, and served half liquid, fluffed over with a bit of powdered sugar and covered with rich cream, is fit for a queen--most especially if the royal lady is ambitious for a fair visage with sweet, soft skin and cheeks just touched with the crimson of health.

A thick porterhouse steak, broiled quickly and well seasoned with salt, pepper and butter, or rare little chops of lamb, are always excellent tonics, as well as complexion tinters.

Very often a lack of beauty is nothing more than a lack of proper nourishment. The best cure in the world for a haggard, wan, white face is a proper understanding of good foods. Sometimes a tonic of iron is needed to brace the wearied physical state. Cod liver oil, which is so very disagreeable to most people, is the sure cure for the girl whose extreme slenderness causes her to lie awake nights to fret and worry. But when the oil is prepared with malt it is even better, and also less trying to swallow. A combination of malt and hypo-phosphates is excellent too, and will bring back the fire of energy to the eye, and the roses to the cheeks. A dessertspoonful taken before meals will stimulate and strengthen, and get the tired body into a better state to resist the wear and tear of ill health or overwork.

One beautiful woman of my acquaintance declares that the secret of her radiant looks is simply lettuce and olive oil. She eats lettuce summer and winter, and this queer complexion cure has certainly worked like a charm in her case. She buys the crisp young head lettuce, being careful to use only the inner leaves. Over this she pours two tablespoonfuls of the best olive oil and the very slightest dash of vinegar. Salt and the least wee bit of sugar finish the salad. The good qualities of lettuce are usually destroyed by rich, mustardy dressings, that breed acute dyspepsia and desperate despair over good looks. But olive oil and lettuce is as good a combination for rugged health and a fair face as one can find in a year's search from Cape Horn to the Yukon. Others besides the lovely lady of whom I speak have found it so. The secret, though, is, I fancy, in the olive oil, which is an excellent aperient.

A complexion-destroying habit is that of eating late lunches just before going to bed. An apple or an orange is a benefit--as is also plenty of cold, distilled water--but when it comes to gnawing chicken bones, devouring big slabs of rich cake or finishing up a dish of leftover salad, then is the time that kind relatives or guardians should step in, say a word and take a hand. The girl should be saved from herself at almost any expense.

Fruit is a panacea for many complexion ills. What a pity, then, that blind womankind persists in dabbing things on her nose instead of putting healthful, purifying beauty food into her stomach.

There is no reason in the world why fruit should be considered a luxury. It should be used as a staple article of diet. Surely that must have been the original intention. But alas, how many housewives will pay forty cents for a can of lobster that will upset stomachs, frazzle pleasant tempers, cause all sorts of complexion horrors and bring a perfect comet trail of nightmares and dyspepsia! And these same women will wrap themselves in a sanctimonious mantle of economy when the woman next door pays the same sum for a dozen great juicy oranges.

Grapes and apples are among the most nutritious fruits, and there is nothing in the world so good for a skin of oily surface or yellow hue as a grape diet. Besides, grapes are extremely appetizing, are very easily digested and are sure to agree with even the most delicate stomach. Ripe peaches have nearly all the merits of the grape, and, if in proper condition, are also quite unlikely to bring about indigestion or stomach disorders.

There has never yet been concocted a better spring tonic than strawberries. The reason why they are particularly excellent to enrich and purify the blood is because they contain a larger percentage of iron than any other fruit. It is a shame ever to embarrass and humiliate the luscious things by imprisoning them in the indigestible layers of a shortcake. A fluff of pure powdered sugar and a dash of whipped cream and you have a toothsome dish fit for the most finicky god that ever graced Olympia's pleasant realms.

The woman who has a dingy, muddy skin must pin her faith to oranges, lemons and limes. These are simply unrivaled as complexion clearers. The juice of the grape fruit is fine, too. Fruits of this class stimulate and make active the digestive organs, which, as you probably know, are the main seat of nearly all complexion ills. A breakfast of oranges and strawberries will do more toward making you a pretty, wholesome, healthy woman than almost anything else.

To be perfectly wholesome, fruit with firm flesh, like plums or apples or cherries, must be thoroughly masticated. The skin of raw fruit should under no circumstances be eaten. It is covered invariably with multitudes of minute germs which always swarm upon the surface of the fruit and multiply rapidly under favorable conditions of warmth. Before eating grapes or cherries all dust and impurities must be removed by careful washing in several waters.

But to sum up the entire question of diet, eat what you know will agree with you, and choose the blood-making, nourishing foods. Let fruit and vegetables predominate in your meals, but do not avoid meats entirely. Cake is not harmful unless very rich, but greasy pastries--like pies and tarts and things of that sort--are simply utterly, hopelessly impossible! Fats make the skin oily and coarse, pastries produce pimples and blackheads faster than you can doctor them away, and too much sweets will have about the same effect. Instead of buying candies, save your money and acquire a fine complexion along with a bank account. It will pay in the end.

SLEEP.

"What a delightful thing rest is! The bed has become a place of luxury to me. I would not exchange it for all the thrones in the world."--_Napoleon I._

If womankind half realized the beauty benefits of plenty of restful, refreshing sleep, all femininity would be crawling into bed at sunset. I've often wondered why the great sisterhood that is praying and working and fretting for physical loveliness does not understand that more real help comes from rational, hygienic living than can be squeezed out of all the cosmetic jars that ever enticed weak feminine hearts.

Beauty sleep! Why, we've heard of it since the long-ago days when our blessed mothers sung it, lullaby-fashion, into our ears! As little girls it brightened the "sand-man" hour and made us go contentedly to bed. As women it should rightly continue its good work, and the dear Lord knows we need it more now than we did then, for--perhaps--the crow's feet have begun to show their ugly little tracks and the fine complexion of early girlhood is losing its luster and brightness, and is growing a bit dull and yellowed--like a leaf first touched with the autumn chill.

Perhaps you won't believe it, but there are right ways of sleeping and wrong ways as well. The girl who curls up like a shrimp is the one who will be writing to me in a great flurry and worry, telling me that her shoulders are round, and that she simply can't make them nice and square as they should be for the new tailor-made that is to transform her into a happy little Easter girl! The woman who is horrified to find wrinkles appearing like wee birds of omen does not have to tell me that she is a pillow fiend and sleeps with her head half a foot higher than her heels. It stands to reason that a pillow will push the flesh of the face up into little lines. There is no necessity for pillows at all, and girls don't need them for comfort any more than a little puppy dog needs patent leathers or overshoes. The bed should be hard and perfectly flat, with springs that do not sag or give and let the poor sleeper roll down in the middle in a jumbled-up heap. A hair mattress is the best for health and comfort, but others will do nicely if they are only perfectly flat and not too soft.

The first thing to do, then, is to dispense with the pillow. If this change cannot be accomplished all at once, then let your pillow be gradually made smaller and smaller until none at all is desired. Your sleep will be much better, and after the habit is once formed a pillow is looked upon with derision. I know foolish mothers who put their children to sleep on pillows as big as a school-girl's love for caramels, and the poor babies tumble and toss, and the next morning those mothers dose them for a pain in the "tum-tum." Alack-a-day! Babies don't need pillows--unless it be those little soft cushions of down that are as flat as pancakes.

But to return from babies to beauty. If your sleep is restless and you awaken with a dull headache and the feeling of weariness that makes you want to begin the night over again so as to get refreshed, you may be sure that something is wrong--either you are worried or troubled or are working too hard for your own good. Perhaps your digestion is out of order, or the room is not properly ventilated. It may be any of these things that keep you from getting the rest that is really so very necessary for health and comfort and good looks.

Heavy bedding is also distressing, and as good a maker of nightmares as deviled crabs or plum pudding. Light blankets make the best covering. Let the window be open at top and bottom, so as to have perfect ventilation. Don't eat an indigestible lunch before retiring; this is the greatest of all beauty follies. Lie on the abdomen, with your hands at your sides. This position will keep your shoulders back, will give you a good figure and a better carriage. When you have followed these directions and still find that you spend most of the night crawling around over your bed vainly seeking a comfortable and restful spot, then you can make up your mind that you need a good tonic and a doctor's counsel, for your nerves or your digestive organs are not as they should be.

To sum it all up in a nutshell: You must sleep well, and you must sleep a great deal if you wish to be the "woman beautiful." Sitting up late at night will cause grey hair as will nothing else. It makes those dark circles about the eyes, and causes the "windows of the soul," to lose half their luster and softness and beauty. Who ever saw a pretty woman with dull, lifeless eyes? She wouldn't be pretty were she so afflicted. By sleeping properly, the body is kept stronger and fresher, and thus the complexion is benefited greatly. Wrinkles do not come so soon, the skin does not take on that muddy, yellow hue as it would otherwise, and cheeks are pink and rosy with that greatest of all rouges--Health.

There's a heap of truth in all this. If you do not believe it, then give up late hours--be they for study or pleasure--and see if the problem won't work itself out nicely with you. I think it will. In fact, I am really quite sure of it.

EXERCISE

"Better to hunt in fields for health unbought Then fee the doctor for a nauseous draught The wise for cure on exercise depend; God never made His work for man to mend."

--_Dryden._

It would have done your heart good to see her.

She came into the room with the briskness of a March flurry of snow. Her cheeks were poppy-red, her eyes sparkled with the mere joy of living. And she chuckled happily as she tucked back the curly scolding locks that were flying about, all helter-skelter, like feathers unloosed or fluffy chicks blowing away from the mother wing.

"Isn't it jolly?" she chirped, as she threw her muff on the floor and made a dive for Peter Jackson. Peter Jackson is a cat, as black as the ace of spades and as pugilistic a feline as ever walked a fence.

"Isn't what jolly?" I queried. "The weather or your sprightly self? Do you know, you'd make a splendid poster now for some new-fangled cork-soled walking shoe? Or perhaps a bearskin ulster for Klondike wear. I'm sure a feather boa concern would pay a fortune for your picture. I would I were an artist man, with a little brush and a little pencil and a little palette with nice little paint puddles on it----"

"What-in-the-world? Here I start in to dilate upon the joys of exercise and off you go, just like a musical top with your buzz-buzz-buzz, and your incomprehensible talk about little painters and little palettes and little paint puddles. I'm sure it's not a bit nice of you."

Peter Jackson was shoved to the floor.

"But walking is jolly!" she piped, "and I've just had the very gloriousest tramp and I feel as fine as a--what is it they say? Oh, as fine as a violin--I--I mean fiddle. I walked miles and miles--perhaps not quite so far--and the wind was blowing a blue streak right in my face. Ugh! first it made me shiver and creep up into my collar. But bimeby I got nice and warmy, and my cheeks tingled. I felt as if I could walk from here to the place where the sun goes down. Do you know, I never before realized how much fun it was to take a good tramp. I've half a mind to reform from my rôle of lazy-bones and walk every day, whether it snows, blows, cyclones, or turns warm, and fells us all with sunstrokes and heat prostrations."

"Health is the vital principle of bliss, and exercise of health," said I, quoting Thomson.

"Oh, well," and my pretty, rosy-cheeked guest arose. "I must be going. You know how it is when one gets to preaching physical culture and spouting poetry. Ta-ta!" and away she went, like the fleeting memory of last night's dream.

* * * * *

If women paid as much attention to exercise as do men there would not be so many wrinkles and stooped shoulders among the feminine sex, and old age wouldn't rap on the door ahead of time. The girl who goes in for outdoor sport, who isn't afraid of walking a block or two, who loves the cold air and who revels in wheeling and swimming and skating, is the one who won't be an old woman in appearance while she is still young in years. Keep the muscles firm and healthy by exercise. This will not only improve your carriage and add to your general development, but will aid the digestive organs in their work and keep you animated and cheery. Who of us does not know the inspiration of a walk in the open air after a few days spent in the close atmosphere of the house? Fresh air is the elixir of life. We can't have too much of it, and--oh, my girls--think of the exceeding cheapness of it! It can be got for the asking, which is more than one can say for the various beauty pomades and lotions that beckon us toward poverty.

Walking and skating are the best exercises during the winter, but all kinds of exercises are acceptable, providing they are gone about in the proper manner. It is easy enough to see why thorough and regular exercise is absolutely necessary to health.

We all know--at least, we all should know--that the general size of the human body depends on muscular development. The same bony frame which makes a slim-jim girl that tips the scales at seventy-five pounds can be padded with good solid flesh until it boasts of a triple chin, fingers like wee roly-poly puddings, and a full 200 pounds in weight. The framework of the body counts little toward size.

The muscles are like the various bits of machinery which go to make up a steam engine. In performing their work they produce heat and motion. The fuel which supplies this force is taken into the body as food, prepared for use in the intestinal tract, and from there carried by the blood to be stored up in the muscles and various tissues as latent force. Through the circulation of the blood the whole body is heated by muscular exercise. It stands to reason that continual exercise of a certain kind will develop certain muscles. For instance, there's the arm of the blacksmith or the firmly developed legs of the danseuse. The same muscle that grows when used within certain limits will waste away when deprived of proper exercise.

In physical culture the object is the symmetrical development of all the muscles, not one at the expense of the other. So, for that reason, don't pin your faith to dumb-bells and Indian clubs and neglect more necessary exercise. If you do you will in time find yourself possessed of big Sandow arms that will make the rest of you look as spindle-like as a last year's golden-rod stalk.

Walking is as good a form of exercise as anything yet discovered. But walking as most girls and women walk won't do you one bit of good. You might just as well spend your time trying to count 700 backward or while away the hours talking 1880 fashions with the woman next door, for all the health or happiness or physical development that you will get out of it.

Corsets and bands and belts must be done away with. You must have full, free use of your lungs. Then, don't wear heavy petti-coats that will retard the free movements of your legs and make your hips ache with their tiresome weight. Dress warmly but as lightly as possible.

Above everything else don't stick your fingertips into a muff and waddle along like a little duck in sealskin and purple velvet trimmings. Your arms must swing easily at your sides. Thus equipped walking should not be a task, but a great, big, lovely joy, no matter if the frost does nip your nice little nose and make your cheeks feel as if they had been starched, dried, ironed and hung on the line to air.

English women who come to America can tell us a thing or two about long walks. Only the other day a pretty Englishwoman with a complexion like apple blossoms casually divulged the information that a walk of ten or fifteen miles was an old, old story to her. So, when I say that three miles a day--the three miles ought really to be covered inside an hour--is not a bit too much to give one's muscles the necessary exercise, I hope you won't lean back in your chair and gracefully expire. Some of you will gasp, no doubt, for a walk of five blocks to a suburban station is usually looked upon as a heroic martyrdom to circumstances and environments.

Alas, for woman's fickleness! And alas, for her playful habit of going to extremes! Suppose, for instance, that Polly Jones says she is going to take a nice long walk every day of her life; that she knows the bountiful blessings and benefits of a brisk tramp, and that she will take that tramp in spite of obstacles as big as the Auditorium or as immense as her longing for a cherry-colored silk petticoat.

The first day--and, mind you, she has not walked a mile for weeks, the lazy girl--she covers five miles in an hour and ten minutes.

And when she comes home she's such a wreck that the whole family is up in arms in a jiffy, and whisk out the tomahawks ready for war. That's the end of Polly Jones' pedestrian exercises.

And Daisy Brown. She does quite the same thing, only not so violently. The first day she walks four miles, the next two, and then comes a trip around the corner to get arnica and liniments for her poor, aching bones. Thus also terminates Daisy's stern resolution to take daily constitutionals.

But the wise woman. Daisy's and Polly's methods are not hers. Far from it! When she begins to walk for health and beauty she dons loose, comfortable clothes, and with swinging arms and head well back, strides along briskly and easily. Her first day's walk is scarcely a mile. The second tramp is longer; and gradually the distance is increased until the three miles are covered in about fifty minutes.

The wise woman does not take her exercise in the afternoon, but in the morning, an hour or so after breakfast, when the day is young and everything seems bright and hopeful and cheery. Then it is that the babies are out in their go-carts and carriages, and the "chillens" are trooping to school. It's heaps pleasanter than an afternoon walk when one has more of the worries and events of the day on one's mind.

It is the regularity of exercise--and living, in fact--that brings the best results. A stated time for baths, meals, rests and walks is the proper plan for those fortunate ones who are not rushed into a condition of decrepit antiquity trying to do fourteen different tasks in thirteen small, limited minutes. Some of us, the very busy ones, cannot have the necessary rests during the day, but baths and exercise can usually be arranged and carried out. They should be, for they are of more vital import than most of us realize.

Running is splendid exercise, but we city folk have few opportunities for exhilarating fun of that sort. A woman sprinting for a cable car might quite as well be a trained bear in a pink mosquito netting petticoat for the sensation and giggles she creates. With a bonnet perched over one ear or dangling dizzily from an escaping empire knot she is neither a dignified nor an inspiring picture.