, but a knowledge
of animal physiology is still so considered by many. Dr. H.R.
Hopkins, of New York, wrote in 1895, regarding the teaching of
physiology: "How can we teach growing girls the functions of the
various parts of the human body, and still leave them their
modesty? That is the practical question that has puzzled me for
years."

In England, the use of drawers was almost unknown among women
half a century ago, and was considered immodest and unfeminine.
Tilt, a distinguished gynecologist of that period, advocated such
garments, made of fine calico, and not to descend below the knee,
on hygienic grounds. "Thus understood," he added, "the adoption
of drawers will doubtless become more general in this country,
as, being worn without the knowledge of the general observer,
they will be robbed of the prejudice usually attached to an
appendage deemed masculine." (Tilt, _Elements of Health_, 1852,
p. 193.) Drawers came into general use among women during the
third quarter of the nineteenth century.

Drawers are an Oriental garment, and seem to have reached Europe
through Venice, the great channel of communication with the East.
Like many other refinements of decency and cleanliness, they were
at first chiefly cultivated by prostitutes, and, on this account,
there was long a prejudice against them. Even at the present day,
it is said that in France, a young peasant girl will exclaim, if
asked whether she wears drawers: "I wear drawers, Madame? A
respectable girl!" Drawers, however, quickly became acclimatized
in France, and Dufour (op. cit., vol. vi, p. 28) even regards
them as essentially a French garment. They were introduced at the
Court towards the end of the fourteenth century, and in the
sixteenth century were rendered almost necessary by the new
fashion of the _vertugale_, or farthingale. In 1615, a lady's
_calecons_ are referred to as apparently an ordinary garment. It
is noteworthy that in London, in the middle of the same century,
young Mrs. Pepys, who was the daughter of French parents, usually
wore drawers, which were seemingly of the closed kind. (_Diary_
of S. Pepys, ed. Wheatley, May 15, 1663, vol. iii.) They were
probably not worn by Englishwomen, and even in France, with the
decay of the farthingale, they seem to have dropped out of use
during the sev