Читать книгу The House We Live In; or, The Making of the Body онлайн

42 страница из 44

Helen: It helps us feel different objects. Those who are blind learn to do many useful things by the sense of touch.

Mother: Yes, we learn many things by this sense. You know when you show anything to a baby it stretches out its little hands to “feel” of the object. How do you think such poisons as alcohol and tobacco affect this covering of the body?

Amy: They must make more waste in the body, and so the skin has more to do.

Percy: I think it must fill it full of poison.

Elmer: Does alcohol make the skin look red, mother?

Mother: Yes; that is why a man who drinks beer or other drinks containing alcohol, has such a red face. Sometimes his nose is called a “rum blossom.” The alcohol makes the blood-vessels larger than they should be, and so his nose and face become very red. Bad food is also hurtful to the skin, for it can not be clear and healthy if the blood is not clean. Pimples and sores are caused by bad blood, and they show that better food is needed in the body.

Amy: But you haven’t told us what the roof of the body house is, mother.