Читать книгу Old Age Deferred - Arnold Lorand - Страница 10

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In the previous editions of this book I have shown that it is possible to improve old looks through hygienic measures, the use of the extracts of certain glands, like the thyroid and ovaries and also by the employment of certain drugs like arsenic and the preparations of iodine. I would like to add now a few cosmetic hints against old looks some of which I had already published a few years ago, as a collaborator to the handbook of cosmetics of the dermatologist, Prof. M. Joseph, of Berlin (M. Joseph, Handbuch der Kosmetik, Leipzig, 1912).

In persons of certain age and also in younger persons with a fading expression of the face and beginning wrinkles I have found, as efficacious in producing an immediate improvement, the gentle application to the face of any kind of fats of pure quality and the rubbing thereon of some reliable preparation of white powder. The powder should afterward be wiped off very carefully. It should not be put on in thick layers, for then, as after the use of pastes and paints in general, lines may be created where they are not yet present and lines already existing may be hollowed out to veritable wrinkles. No powder should be visible on the face. The object is to add to faces with dry skin the best variety of fat with reference to its animal origin so as to make up for the wanting secretion of the sebaceous glands and to replace, if possible to a certain extent, the fat wanting in the tissues. All kinds of massaging of the skin should be avoided; only a gentle rubbing is allowed. In fact, I consider massage as deleterious to the face, except it is done by a qualified masseur who is an expert in this kind of massage with a correct anatomical knowledge of the muscles of the face and of the direction they are running. Special care must be taken that the massage of the face should never be done with fats, as this would promote the formation of lines and wrinkles and even of deep ones, if done unskillfully. The massage of the face should consist in gentle strokings of the face with the end of the fingers and always following the direction of the muscles.

The powders used should be of the best possible quality. Before all they should not contain any metallic salts and especially not lead. Unhappily some of the very best powders are prepared with it, as lead gives to the powders a specially white and attractive aspect. But I should like to bring home to the ladies the fact, that these powders are the most apt, especially in persons who perspire easily, to create lines and wrinkles and to give to young faces in a short time an old appearance.

The best powders I consider those which consist of fine rice-powder, amylum, or talcum, and they produce the best effect, if they are not visible on the face. I have often seen the finest complexions ruined by the frequent usage of thick powders, pastes, and paints. The above-mentioned procedure of rubbing in fats and thereupon some of the finest hygienic powders should only be done every other day. To give to fading faces a certain tonicity I recommend the use of alcohol, diluted with three times as much water, which, in the same manner as diluted vinegar, will also improve the complexion. I have found that a very strongly diluted solution of the extract of the suprarenal glands has also a marked effect in toning up the muscles of the face, if rubbed in gently. Only small quantities of the diluted solution should be used for this purpose.

As gray hairs create, even in persons still young, an elderly appearance, it might appear to their advantage to color them. It is best to use such coloring only in regions of small extent rather than in a general way. As the most inoffensive coloring of gray hair among dark hair, I would consider the preparations containing nitrate of silver. Those which contain lead or copper should be condemned.

After all the best weapon against old looks is a hygienic life by which we can best avoid the development of a condition which already at an early age gives an old aspect to the tissues, i.e., of arteriosclerosis, or hardening of the arteries.