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Re: "Beauty is only skin deep, but...."

Posted by Pamela on October 01, 2007

In Reply to: "Beauty is only skin deep, but...." posted by Angela on September 30, 2007

: I have always heard my father use this phrase - "Beauty is only skin deep, but ugliness is to the bone." The first part of this phrase, "Beauty is only skin deep" is listed in your archives but I could not find the last part of the phrase, "...but ugliness is to the bone". Can you tell me what the origin of this phrase is?

The Trivia library (http://www.trivia-library.com/b/origins-of-sayings-beauty-is-skin-deep.htm) has the original saying and say the other version ("an old jingle") is "author unknown":

"Beauty is but skin deep,
ugly lies the bone;
Beauty dies and fades away,
but ugly holds its own."
(© 1975 - 1981 by David Wallechinsky & Irving Wallace Reproduced with permission from "The People's Almanac" series of books.)

I don't know whether the "ugly lies the bone" is a typo (something seems to be missing). Pamela