Mix together one yolk of egg and two grams
of white wax melted by gentle heat; add a little sweet almond oil.
Dip the nails in this pomade every night and then put on loose
gloves. After three weeks, the nails should be beautiful and long.
Receipts and Remedies, 1908
**********
Strawberry Face Baths
For the face the ripe mashed berry makes
an excellent bath, but it cannot be used by all alike. The
brown-skinned beauty will find her complexion wonderfully improved
thereby. The acid will cleanse the complexion, while the rosy glow
of the berries will impart a pleasing tinge to the skin.
There are olive beauties who depend upon the strawberry face-bath
from season to season. They use the first berries that come, and
keep on with the berry bath until the last bit of the crimson fruit
has disappeared from the fruit stalls. They claim it gives them the
half rosy look which is so essential to an appearance of youth.
A fresh complexion is necessary to the woman who wants to keep her
youth. If she be dark skinned or yellow skinned, or if her face be
muddy she will find a ready relief in the fresh juice of the finest
berry of spring.
Those who are too fair to use the clear juice of the berry can make
a nice complexion bath. Take half a cup of ripe berries and squeeze
the juice into a basin, straining it through a fine cloth. To this
juice add a pint of boiling water and a cup of red vinegar. This
makes a nice bath for the hands and arms, and it is excellent for
the face, though the eyes should be kept tightly closed while using
it. It can be daubed upon the cheeks and forehead without touching
the eyes.
Vivilore: The Pathway to Mental
and Physical Perfection, 1900
**********
The Bath
Upon rising, take a complete bath. A simple washing out of the eyes
is not sufficient. The complete bathing of the body once each day is
of the utmost importance to health and beauty. Not more than a quart
of water is necessary. Use the hands the same as you do upon the
face. No sponge is required, and water is more agreeable to the skin
when applied with the bare hand. Use rainwater; and, for a healthy
person, the temperature of that which has been in the room during
the night is about right. Use plenty of soap, and wash quickly.
Follow by wiping the skin perfectly dry with a soft towel, and
afterward give the body and limbs a thorough rubbing. The glow that
is diffused throughout the face and body by this exercise is worth
more in giving a ruddy, beautiful complexion than all the rouge and
powder in the world.
The arrangements for this bath are very simple. There is nothing
required but a small amount of soft water, a piece of soap, and a
towel. No elaborately-fitted-up bathroom is necessary. We have
detailed all the appliances that are essential, and they are so
simple that the laboring classes and the poor can have them, and be
clean, as well as the rich. Occasionally, warm water, with a sponge,
may be necessary to remove completely all the oily exudations from
the body, but for the ordinary bath this is not essential.
The sun and air bath is very excellent for health; therefore to
leave the body exposed in the sun for a short time previous to
dressing is very invigorating.
Before the breakfast hour the lungs should be completely inflated
with fresh air. The meals should be partaken of with regularity,
while more or less of fruit, oatmeal, rice, cracked wheat, graham
bread, etc., will be found necessary as a diet, in order to keep the
skin clear.
**********
Bathing With Oil
One of the best of beauty baths, delightful in its effects on the
skin and the whole system, is the olive oil bath. It cleanses the
pores from all foreign matter, invigorates and nourishes the skin
and tissues, is very soothing and strengthening to weak
constitutions and is especially good for thin people. Slender,
nervous people are liable to give off their magnetic force too
freely and become especially depleted if they use water baths alone.
We endorse for such a rubbing with pure olive oil twice or three
times a week in a warm room; the hot water bath with good soap and
friction followed with olive oil is necessary for cleanliness and
suppleness of the body. Swimmers who spend a good deal of time in
water should oil themselves, as fatty elements are non-conductors.
The nude races are in the habit of oiling or greasing the skin, by
which method they keep it soft and pliable.
Saturate a small piece of flannel with oil, or pour a little in the
palm of the hand, and rub it thoroughly into the flesh, taking a
part of the body at a time, and afterwards rub well with a Turkish
towel.
This bath is of benefit at any time, though best taken after an
ordinary warm water bath, and drying.
**********
The Bran Bath
This is another which has proved especially beautifying in its
effects. When the skin is rough or easily irritated, put enough bran
in the water to make it milky. A good way is to take two quarts of
bran for a full bath-tub, tie or sew it up in a bag of cheesecloth,
or other thin material, and use in the bath. These bran bags can be
obtained at the druggist's, perfumed and filled with soap, but it is
better to make them one's self.
**********
Oriental Bath
Seek the sunniest room in the house or attic, remove all clothing,
stand or sit perfectly nude or lie down before a south window or an
east or west window, at the time of day when the sun shines
brightest. Remain quiet, free the mind from all fear or worry,
breathe softly and center your mind on the most beautiful thing you
can think of. Cover the window, the lower part, to protect the body
from view, with the thinnest cheesecloth or any thin substance. Rub
the body in circular movements with the hand and rub dry with a
Turkish towel.
Those who take the sun and air bath in this manner gain such vital
power that they can endure the greatest heat or cold with impunity.
Duration of bath from thirty minutes to an hour or more.
Sources for the Baths
* The New Revised Hill's Manual, 1897
** VIVILORE: The Pathway to Mental and Physical Perfection, 1900
**********
The Care of the Hair
Do not wrap anything around the head when
retiring, and always arrange the hair as carefully for sleep as you
do for the day; part it smoothly in various places, brush carefully,
and then braid it in plaits, which should be allowed to hang loose.
If the hair becomes knotted, rather than tear it out by attempting
to disentangle it, take the scissors and cut the knot out. Do not
wear too much false hair. Do not use heavy hair-pins, and if you
wear your hair crimped, use rubber pins or bands to put it up on.
They will not break the hair so easily nor hurt the head so much,
nor be so likely to become undone during the night.
