BALDNESS

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume XVI, Issue 5017, 4 May 1895, Page 3

BALDNESS

The cause of baldness is a question (says the British Medical Journal) which has a personal interest for many people in these days when the " new man" finds it almost as difficult to keep his hair, as the ," new woman" does to find a husband. The theory of the bald-headed man generally is, that his exceptionally active brain has used up the '. blood supply which should have nourished his scalp; but those whose crop of hair still stands untouched by the scythe of time, unkindly hint that this explanation is' of a piece with Falstaffs excuse that ho has lost his voico by "singing of anthems." Then there is the theoiy of the hat, which we : are told makes for sanitary uuright- ■ eousness in two ways—allowing no ventilation, and by its bard rim cutting off part of the blood supply from the scalp. Again, there is sebotrhcea, which propares the way for fungi that blight tho hair. It would have been wonderful if that patbeological scapegoat, indigestion, had not had this particular misdeed laid to its charge. We are not surprised, therefore, to read in an American contemporary thatdyspepsia is the great cause of baldness, i This is how tho mischief is dono:— "Nature," we are assured, "is very careful to guard and protect and supply the vital organs with the proper amount of nutriment; but when she cannot command a sufficient quanily of blood supply for all the organs, naturally she cuts off the supply of parts the least vital, like the hair and nails." The hair in fact, dies that the nobler parts may live up to a proper standard of physiological efficiency. The best way to escapo baldness is, therefore to be careful in our diet, and above all to avoid irregularity in meals—a counsel of perfection which the busy man too often finds it impossible to follow. We are not prepared to deny that indigestion may have something to do with baldness, but the part it plays is probably secondary. We know of no evidence thatbaldheaded men are more dyspeptic than their neighbours, and women who suffer much—ohielly through their own fault—from digestivo troubles are very seldom bald. Tho increasing prevalence of baldness might, with at least as much plausibility, be ascribed to the general betterment in our social condition that is taking.placo. The late Princo Consort (who himself losj his hair early) held that baldness is a sign of breeding j heredity, therefore, rather than indigestion would • account for its frequency in the : upper ranks of society. On the other i hand, hairiness and anarchism often i go together, as if thebomb-throwing ; brotherhood had doteiminedtothrow • off even the mild tyranny of the I barber with other forms of Government.