Voice, song and speech : a practical guide for singers and speakers : from the combined view of vocal surgeon and voice trainer / by Lennox Browne and Emil Behnke.

  • Browne, Lennox, 1841-1902.
Date:
1884
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Voice, song and speech : a practical guide for singers and speakers : from the combined view of vocal surgeon and voice trainer / by Lennox Browne and Emil Behnke. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by University of Bristol Library. The original may be consulted at University of Bristol Library.

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    of flannel four or five inches in depth should be worn— across the loins only, by those inclined to be stout, by others, around the whole girth of the body, in the same region—by all who are subject to take cold, who are of a rheumatic disposition, or who are liable to liver disorder; in other words by nine-tenths of residents of the British Isles. The effect of such a band is to keep circulation active to all the organs of secretion and excretion, and so to favour activity of digestion and assimilation. As to the second point, there is much diversity of opinion, and in our belief it is not of so much importance to keep a neck covered or uncovered—that is a question rather of usage from youth and individual experience—as it is that the neck of the voice-user should be unconstricted. No button should fasten above the level of the top of the sternum (breast-bone), so that all those parts left free from the bony cage of the thorax by nature should be actually unconflned. The fashionable collar of the male masher, the dog-collar of the fast young lady, the clerical band of the ritualistic ecclesiastic, the tight, rigid stock of the soldier, are all equally unphysiological, and when carried to excess, as has been proved by Surgeon-Major Myers of the Coldstream Guards in the case of soldiers, even pro- ductive of aneurism, one of the gravest disorders arising from obstruction to free circulation at the root of the neck. Constriction of this region is a frequent cause of glandular swellings, enlarged tonsils, and congestions of the lining membranes of the throat. We have already spoken against the habitual use of respi- rators, but must repeat that it is necessary to protect not the mouth only, but nose and ears by loose cloud or veil against night air, dust, fog, and cold damp atmospheres. We have also alluded at length to the detriment occasioned