WARTIME soap rationing hit some harder than others.

While the city's mucky weans were delighted to let off from washing behind their ears, spare a thought for this poor Glasgow chimney sweep, shwoing off his ration card and his single block of carbolic.

As if cleaning the city's chimneys of soot wasn't a tough enough job already, he had to try and wash away the workaday grime with an ever-vanishing sliver of soap. If he had any sense, he'd have gone off to the local wash-house to make use of the communal facilities. We certainly can't imagine his wife would have been happy to rinse away the tidemark after he'd taken a dip.

Still, looking on the brightside, a hundred years earlier, rather than a pole and brush, he'd have been sending kids up the lums.