Page:Personal beauty how to cultivate and preserve it in accordance with the laws of health (1870).djvu/164

 sublimate, sometimes recommended, must be heedfully used, as we have known them, even when very weak, to irritate the skin violently.

Not at all dangerous, and of good service in rendering the hands soft and smooth, is this perhaps familiar recipe: Take horse-chestnuts, peel and dry them thoroughly in the oven. Pound or grind them into a fine powder. Put a tablespoonful into the wash-water, whenever the hands are rinsed.

Here is another wash which has been deservedly praised, not only for preventing redness of the hands, but for improving the skin, and destroying warts:—

Muriate of ammonia     a teaspoonful; Aromatic vinegar       a tablespoonful; Tepid soft water       a quart.

Soak the hands in this for ten or fifteen minutes morning and evening.

The use of "cosmetic gloves," as they are called, has long been known in some countries, and there are ladies who glove themselves as regularly on retiring to bed, as they do on going into the street. These gloves, when designed simply to soften and whiten the hands, are prepared by brushing the inside of a pair of stout kid or dog-skin gloves with the following mixture:—

Yelk of two fresh eggs, Oil of sweet almonds, of each two tablespoonfuls; Tincture of benzoin          a dessertspoonful; Rose-water                   a tablespoonful.