Always rub the spot with cold cream or oil after using acid on the fingers. The cream supplies the place of the natural oil of the skin, which the acid removes with the stain.
To give a fine color to the nails, the hands and fingers must be well lathered and washed with scented soap; then the nails must be rubbed with equal parts of cinnabar and emery, followed by oil of bitter almonds. To take white specks from the nails, melt equal parts of pitch and turpentine in a small cup; add to it vinegar and powdered sulphur. Rub this on the nails, and the specks will soon disappear. Pitch and myrrh melted together may be used with the same results.
An embrocation for whitening and softening the hands and arms, which dates far back, possibly to King James’s times, is made from myrrh, one ounce; honey, four ounces; yellow wax, two ounces; rose-water, six ounces. Mix the whole in one well-blended mass for use, melting the wax, rose-water, and honey together in a dish over boiling water, and adding the myrrh while hot. Rub this thickly over the skin before going to bed. It is good for chapped surfaces, and would make an excellent mask for the face.
To improve the skin of the hands and arms, the following old English recipe is given, the principle of which is now revived in different cosmetic combinations. Take two ounces of fine hard soap—old Windsor or almond soap—and dissolve it in two ounces of lemon juice. Add one ounce of the oil of bitter almonds, and as much oil of tartar. Mix the whole, and stir well till it is like soap, and use it to wash the hands. This contains the most powerful agents which can safely be applied to the skin, and it should not be used on scratches or chapped hands. For the latter a delicate ointment is made from three ounces of oil of sweet almonds, an ounce of spermaceti, and half an ounce of rice flour. Melt these over a slow fire, keep stirring till cold, and add a few drops of rose-oil. This makes a good color for the lips by mixing a little alkanet powder with it, and may be used to tinge the finger-tips. It is at least harmless.
Oil of almonds, spermaceti, white wax, and white sugar-candy, in equal parts, melted together, form a good white salve for the lips and cheeks in cold weather. A fine cold cream, much pleasanter to use than the mixtures of lard and tallow commonly sold under that name, is thus made:
Melt together two ounces of oil of almonds and one drachm each of white wax and spermaceti; while warm add two ounces of rose-water, and orange-flower water half an ounce. Nothing better than this will be found in the range of toilet salves.
A wash “for removing tan, freckles, blotches, and pimples,” as the high-sounding preface assures us, is made from two gallons of strong soap-suds, to which are added one pint of alcohol and a quarter of a pound of rosemary. Apply with a linen rag. This is better when kept in a close jar overnight.
Freckle lotion, for the cure of freckles, tan, or sunburned face and hands—something which I would prefer to the rosemary wash before given, is thus made: Take half a pound of clear ox gall, half a drachm each of camphor and burned alum, one drachm of borax, two ounces of rock-salt, and the same of rock-candy. This should be mixed and shaken well several times a day for three weeks, until the gall becomes transparent; then strain it very carefully through filtering-paper, which may be had of the druggists. Apply to the face during the day, and wash it off at night.
Now, Kate, do you see your way clear to the use and benefit of these mixtures? All these articles are to be found at any large druggist’s, or, if not, he will tell you where to find them. The rosemary and honey may be found in that still fragrant store-room of your aunt’s, in the country, unless she has taken to writing very poor serial articles, and let the herb garden and the bees run out. To save trouble, take the recipes and have them made up at once by the druggist, who understands such things; but it is pleasant to dabble in washes and lotions one’s self, like the Vicar of Wakefield’s young ladies. Then have you patience to persevere in their use? For making one’s self beautiful is a work of time and perseverance as much as being an artist, or a student, or a Christian. I wish I were with you, and could keep you up to your preparations, brush your eyebrows, trim your eyelashes, and do the dozen different offices of sympathy and womanly kindness. I should feel that I was the artist putting the touches on something more valuable than any statue ever moulded. Can you feel so yourself? For if you can once get hold of that artistic impulse, you have the secret of all these toilet interferences.