Before using this dye it is necessary to free the hair from grease by washing it with soda or pearlash and water. The hair must be quite dry prior to applying the dye, which is best laid on with an old tooth-brush. This dye does not "strike" for several hours. It needs scarcely be observed that its effects are more rapidly produced by exposing the hair to sunshine and air.
Hair Dye, with Mordant. (Brown.)
| Nitrate of silver, | 1 oz., blue bottles. |
| Rose-water, | 9 oz. " |
| The mordant.—Sulphuret of potassium, | 1 oz., white bottles. |
| " Water, | 8 oz. " |
Hair Dye, with Mordant. (Black.)
| Nitrate of silver, | 1 oz., blue bottles. |
| Water, | 6 oz. " |
| The mordant.—Sulphuret of potassium, | 1 oz., white bottles. |
| " Water, | 6 oz. " |
The mordant is to be applied to the hair first; when dry, the silver solution.
Great care must be taken that the sulphuret is fresh made, or at least, well preserved in closed bottles, otherwise, instead of the mordant acting to make to make the hair black, it will tend to impart a yellow hue. When the mordant is good, it has a very disagreeable odor, and although this is the quickest and best dye, its unpleasant smell has given rise to the
Inodorous Dye.
Blue bottles.—Dissolve the nitrate of silver in the water as in the above, then add liquid ammonia by degrees until the mixture becomes cloudy from the precipitate of the oxide of silver, continue to add ammonia in small portions until the fluid again becomes bright from the oxide of silver being redissolved.
White bottles.—Pour half a pint of boiling rose-water upon three ounces of powdered gall-nuts; when cold, strain and bottle. This forms the mordant, and is used in the same way as the first-named dye, like the sulphuret mordant. It is not so good a dye as the previous one.