BATHS

The habit of bathing, both for cleanline and for pleasure, has been practiced by almost every people from the earliest times. Before the inception of public and private b’s it was customary to bathe in running waters of river, but hot b’s were employed by the early Egyptians, Greeks, and Persians, and are referred to in Homer as restorative after violent exertions. The buildings themselves must in primitive times have had considered pretensions to luxury, for the b. of the Persian king, Darius, excited wonder and admiration of Alexander the Great. It was, however, under Rom. empire that public b’s reached most advanced stage of luxury. The earliest Roman b’s were called piscinoe, and were cold swimming-baths, but later developed into vast establishments called thermoe, which included cold swimming b’s for both sexes, hot b's, vapor b’s, dre ing rooms, a gymnasium, and sometimes also a library and theatre. Such thermoe were erected by the Emperors Agrippa, Nero, Titus, } Domitian, and several later rulers. The b’s appear to have reached their highest state of luxury under Diocletian. Marble seats were provided for you sands of bathers; water flowed from mouths of silver lions into basins of the same precious metal, and while young men payct at ball in the spacious gymnasum, philosophers and elder folks discu ed the news of the day in the marble galleries adorned with mosaics and enriched with sculptures. Soap being then unknown, the Romans had their bodies anointed by the b. attendants with oils and pomades, after which the skin was scraped with a curved metal instrument, called the strig ill us; usual bathing hour was before dinner, but it was not uncommon to take several b’s during course of day. In addition to hot-water and hot-air b's, sun b’s were commonly indulged in by the Greeks and Romans, and the habit of burying the body in sand dates back to even earlier times. There are various modern specialized forms of bathing—Turkish, Ru ian, electric, mineral, etc.