HOW SHOULD WE DRESS?
The New German Theories on Clothing.
BY DORA DE BLAQUIÈRE.
Some allusion has already been made to the medical theories respecting clothing that have emanated recently from a celebrated German professor, Dr. Gustav Jaeger, of the Royal Polytechnic School at Stuttgart. His investigations into the subject commenced in the year 1872, and appeared to have been fairly exhaustive in the way of scientific experiment and personal experience, with the result that Dr. Jaeger considers he has discovered that the health of the world in general is much prejudiced by the materials, as well as the forms, in general use. In Germany his views seem to have met with very extensive acceptance; they have revolutionised the trade of Stuttgart, where Dr. Jaeger practises his profession; and many of the leading men—such as Count von Moltke and others—have adopted his clothing; and it seems probable that his principles will be applied to the German army, with the view of promoting the health of the troops. In Italy the first physicians have declared in favor of it, and so universally does the demand appear to have arisen on the Continent, that the present writer found Dr. Jaeger’s garments commonly exposed for sale in Switzerland, at Berne, Lucerne, and Vevey, and other smaller towns.
The stall for Dr. Jaeger’s clothing has formed an attraction at the “Healtheries” this season, and, by the formation of a limited company, who have opened a depôt in Fore Street for its sale, those who desire to look into the subject, and form their own opinions, will be able to do so in England.
Dr. Jaeger’s reform is not a difficult one, and consists of the fundamental doctrine that, as we are animals, we should wear animal clothing. The physical “reasons why” are—first, that their non-conducting qualities are a guarantee that the temperature of the body shall be in a great measure preserved, while on the other hand the shape and arrangement of their constituent hairs provide for the escape of moisture by capillary attraction; and their adaptation to both these ends is greater than that of any vegetable fabric.
In England we have for many years acted instinctively on these conditions, and we have adopted woollen, in the shape of flannel, for use in cricket, boating, tennis, and in any athletic exercises likely to cause profuse perspiration, as being the safest covering to ensure us against cold and the sudden and dangerous chills which are likely to follow overheating in a climate like ours. Our action has been the result of observation and experience, which, however, according to Dr. Jaeger, might have been carried still further and applied more widely still. For this profuse perspiration is simply an intensification of the daily action of the skin, which only ceases with life itself. If this action be imperfect or repressed, fat and water accumulate in the tissues, lowering their powers, and the flesh, which should feel elastic and firm, is flabby, causing many disorders in the general economy of the body.
Besides water and fat, the skin excretes carbonic acid, and the different decomposed products of fat—such as lactic, formic, and butyric acids—to which the sour odor of perspiration is due. Much carbonic acid is dissolved in the perspiration, and escapes with it. Thus, it is not difficult to see that the kind of covering which acts as the best conductor of moisture and its impurities, and at the same time is a bad conductor of heat, and prevents its escape, is that which we must adopt as the healthiest and the cleanest.
The power of absorption by vegetable life, of the poisonous emanations from animal life, is well known, and this process is not limited, it would appear, to living plants, but is continued by vegetable fibres—such as linen and cotton—with this difference, that the living plant assimilates these emanations and the dead fibre does not, but exhales them again when wetted or warmed. Thus our clothes, in consequence of their vegetable character, attract and retain these noxious principles which should by rights be immediately thrown off. Animal materials, such as wool, are made by nature—according to Dr. Jaeger—to protect animal life, and will neither attract noxious emanations nor prevent their evaporation from the body. This is shown, he observes, by the sense of smell and by the unpleasantness noticed in cotton and linen underclothing, linings, and apparel which have been long worn.
There are many people to whom these considerations have a vital and especial interest. Certain skins perspire much more freely than others. This peculiarity occurs in persons of rheumatic and consumptive tendencies, even when quite free from actual disease. Women in middle age, also, and all in whom the circulatory system is weakened from any cause, have this tendency. But the people to whom, in addition, the Jaeger system appeals the most are certainly those who are corpulent, or show any tendency to become so. And as this point will probably interest many readers, I will give a brief notice of what Dr. Jaeger says on the subject.