The Ypsilanti daily press. (Ypsilanti, Mich.) 1928-1962, 1943-05-05

according to these correspondents,
embarrassing, their companions
make fun of them, they don't like
to be leased and they are sensi-
tlzed to blushing.
l feel very sympathetic toward
these people because | was
blusher once myself. ] can rec
ommend time as a remedy. / have
now reached the stage where my
conscience, my self-consciousness,
my sensibilities and my emotions
are so indurated that even being
insulted by Hitler would not cause
me TO blush.
The medical professionals not
paid a great deal Of attention to
this important physiological ex-
perience. The only literature in
my possession on the subject is a
work by Thomas H. Burgess on
THE Physiology or Mechanism Of
Blushing" published 1880.
DR.. Burgess style is Victorian;
he feels that blushing is exempli-
fed either from timidity during
the modest and sensitive days Of
boyhood or from the conscious feel
ing of having erred in maturer
years" (The latter is something
| have never experiehced.) DR..
Burgess states also: "Blushing
cannot be excited by physical
means-only by the passions. We
can make an individual laugh
against his will by tickling the
soles Of his feet; we can make him
cry by corporal punishment; we
can make him tremble with fear;
we can arouse his anger by strik-
ing him, but we can only make him
blush by appealing to his con-
science"
Contradictions
He rather contradicts himself
page or so further on when he
relates that the face of Charlotte
Corday, who was executed during
the French Revolution, became
suffused with a blush after the
head was severed from the body.
i would be inclined to classify the
severance Of the head from the
body as a physical cause.
He wrote too early to be aware
of the physiology of the vasomotor
nerves-that is, the nerves which
are not under control of the will
and which automatically by their
impulses can contract the small
blood vessels anywhere in the body
or dilate them. Yesterday we con-
sidered the phenomenon Of faint
ing, in which the blood vessels Of
the brain contract by action Of the
nerves. Blushing is just
the opposite: the capillaries Of the
skin dildte due to the influence OF
emotions upon the automatic ner-
vous system.
All People Blush
As matter Of fact blushing
should be rather a badge Of honor;
it shows that all hope Of integrity
and decency is not lost.
All races blush. II may not be
observable in the Negroes, but
there have been observed cases Of
Negroes with a small scar on the
face which changed color under
emotional stress. But if you want
10 see biushing in full flower, you
should study an albino.
The albino is born devoid Of pig
ment. His skin is unnaturally
white, the eye has an iris that
looks reddish because it has nei-
Their brown, black or blue pigment
in it, his hair is from birth abso-
lutely dead white.
The lower parts Of their skin,
however, are well supplied with
blood vessels and alhinos are prone
70 blush. Their sensibilities are
easily excited and when an emo
tion stirs them, the natural dead
whiteness of the skin suddenly
becomes suffused with color which
stretches over the neck and down
the arms, growing from pink to
red, TO blood color, finally TO a
purplish, hectic blush. Even the
eyes take on an appearance as Of
fire.