pleteness must not be sacrificed to popularity," the attainment of
which would be "a didactic triumph, attained only by omitting everything
complicated, and saying only what exists already in the consciousness of
every one."

The two rules for clothing evidently are given when we say, first, that
it should be sufficiently warm to prevent the heat generated by the body
from being too rapidly lost; and second, that it should be sufficiently
loose to allow unimpeded muscular action, whether voluntary or
involuntary. But it is very rare to find either of these rules observed
by girls, and it is also rare to find mothers who are aware that their
daughters are daily violating them.

First, as to the warmth: Every girl who is to be reared in this climate
of extremes and sudden changes should wear shirt and drawers of wool
next her body, and woolen stockings, during at least eight months of the
year.[4] The merino underclothing, so generally worn, is preferable to
cotton or linen, but all-wool flannel is far better; and if trouble is
anticipated from shrinking and fulling, the use of red flannel will
prevent this entirely. I am not speaking of becomingness and grace; I am
speaking of health and conservation of force. Each organism can generate
but a certain amount of vital force, and if a large proportion of this
has to be expended in keeping up the even temperature of the body, a
smaller part than otherwise will go to the carrying on of the other
functions. But relieve the system from the continual drafts made upon
it, resulting from insufficient clothing, and it will be able to assume
duties to which before it found itself inadequate. Some exceptions must
be made to this statement in the case of those to whose skins flannel
proves an irritant--but they are comparatively few; and even in these
cases the flannel could be worn outside, if not inside, of the cotton
or linen underclothing. The mother who will see to it that from her
earliest years the girl is protected, over all parts of her body, by
flannel underclothing, may simply prevent evils which, afterwards, she
and the most skilful physician combined will find themselves unable to
overcome. But the facts are, that, from the earliest days of life, when
the dimpled neck and arms must be admired by visitors, through the days
of childhood, when, dressed during the coldest weather of winter in
linen and white cambric or pique, with her body unprotected from the
chill, the lit