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Show Death ln Hair. j The fair fectuivrs of Sorus'u and the Women's league have made Us acquainted ac-quainted with ever.' possible wron and every possible right of their ill-used ill-used sex. WTe have long known what an outrage it wis to cunfiue women to the ignoble business of homework, when they might occupy a more expanded ex-panded sphere, aud we have been assured as-sured that until their claim to tbe ballot was allowed, civilisation must be deemed to have made no progress. But these, after all, were vague wrongs and abstract rightB. in which few men and not many women cou:d take a very lively or abiding interest. Now, however, universal womanhood is threatened with a danger so vast, .so real and so imminent as to come home with appaling distinctness to every feminine mind. For some time past we have heard distant warnings of the impending calamity, but it was only a day or two ago that we realized its full dimensions. For a long period ominous hems have appeared in various journals, regarding re-garding a certain in6eet which was found to make its home in the jute switches, now in vogue as the correct thing iu feminine head gear This parasite, it was alleged, had a properi--ity to burrow in the adj.icent skin, like a wood-lick, and become thereby the source of much cutaneous irrita tion and disease. This was not dangerous, dan-gerous, and no true woman could hesitate hesi-tate between fashion aud dicomfort. But now we are told that these, uisa-greeable uisa-greeable visitors ate more deadly than was supposed, for the post-mortem ex-iniiuation of a factory girl, wk.0 lately late-ly died at Lowell, revealed the alarming alarm-ing fact that death had been caused by the insect, which liad penetrated the .-kull and attacked the brain. The difficulty, therefore, is much more serious se-rious than was at first supposed. While on the one hand, it is the conviction con-viction of most of the bex that one might as well be out of the world as out of the fashion, on the other hand, it must become a burden if it is to be held only on condition of wearing upon one's head a nest of noxious reptiles. Medusa welcomed death as--a relief from a less severe infliction. It is clear that science aud fashion must join hands at ouee to rescue womanhood from this painful predicament. Here, then, our feminine reformers have a chance to show their zeal iu a practical manner. Let them institute a crusade against tho jute switches at once, or at the very least, set about devising de-vising some way of freeing them from dangerous iusccts. This to be sure, will be difficult, for these nameless horrors, have a more than feline tenacity of lite, and are if anything, a trifle more ferocious fero-cious after an hour's boiling than before. be-fore. Perhaps the simplest remedy would be to secure a change m the mode. When our old friends, the prrjjan'n', became too aggressive from their citadel on the chignon, they were readily disposed of by abolishing the latter. But the switches, as we see. proved a sorry substitute. The only resource seems now to abolish these also: and since art proves so discouraging, discoura-ging, why not return to Nature for once? Most women, if they did but know it, look quite as well with only their own tresses, and since every consideration con-sideration of comeliness and health is adverse to their foreign adornment, it is well they should trast to beauty unadorned una-dorned and untormented. K. Y. Time. |