The Daily Missoulian. [volume] (Missoula, Mont.) 1904-1961, 1917-02-26
The Bathtub Menace
a.. T.. Vieux in the Baltimer SUM


If, some very eminent medical scientists de-
clare this country is becoming or has become a
sub-standard neurotic nation" and it's young men
hollow chesed. soop shouldered mollycoddes it
behooves every patriot, it seems to me- to attempt
to discover the reason, that a remedy may be
found and applied.
am no scientist medical or otherwise but it
seems to that the underlying cause for all this
degeneracy is not far to seek-given a little study
and reflection. 1t lies in the modern Anglomanac
craze for darlington weakening the body by con-
tlnually sluicing IT with water, hot and cold if
one were a house on fire-that has taken possession
in recent years Of our once vrile land.
Until after the Civil war there was probably not
stationary bathtub south of Mason and Dxons line
a tin hand basin, or at most wooden washtub was
considered amply sufficient for any cleansing pur-
poses that might be desired, and any man who went
scrubbing himself oftener than once a week was
looked upon mollycoddle or a foreigner who
needed watching.
OF course there was swimming in summer, and
nave heard man boast that he averaged good
wash for nearly every two days Of the year be-
| cause he went in swimming every day in summer
An od-fashioned robust specimen Of a Southern
gentleman not long ago visit to a relative at
the latters summer place near New York, observing
that his host took bath morning and night and a
plunge into the ocean between times expressed the
wisdom Of former days by saying:
Look here, you wash too much. 1t amt
healthy
But tho fact is the bathing craze almost as bad
in the south elsewhere, and see the result.
Whereas in the old days the south gave to the Ma
ton such men Calhoun, Clay. breckenridge An
drew jackson. Sam Houston, Davy Crockett, Daniel
Boone. John Marshall, Bob Toombs and a host of
others. its leaders in public life in these times in
| cude Cole Bleasc, Claude Kitchn, James Hay,
Josephus Daniels, the Rev. Sidney Cats Cyclone
| Davis and Martin Dies. Nor is the south worse
than the balance of the Nation. Out west where
they once had real men like Buffalo Bill they are
sending the Honorable Miss Rankin to congress-
| All history shows the destructive results of
| the passion for bathing. When the wolf sucked
| Romuus and Remus, it is hardly probable that the
twins were given baths by their foster mother vet
they founded the Eternal City that was to rule the
| world. The doom of the Roman Empire was sound
| ed when bathing became the fad and Caracalla and
the other old luxury loving reprobates built their
| famous and costly baths 1t not long there
| after that the unwashed ruffans from the north
| overwhelmed the bahers and smashed up their
marble and onyx pools
| Like Svengali I could never understand what
made an Englishment so dirty that he violently in
sisted additions every day. A. little saliva on
the of his handkerchief was quite sufficient
for Svcngalis toilet. and yet he was a great must
clan and lived to an old age.
| The practice maintain, is unnatural and inh,i
| man .Aand affirm without fear Of successful con
tradicton that no nation ever acquired the bathing
| mania and survived it, except England and the
United States and these have been afflicted too re-
Gently 10 have shown all the fatal results Already
sam has a congresswomen and is a "substandard'
| neurasth,nic