Polish for Hard or Stained Wood Floors
Eight ounces of yellow beeswax, two quarts of spirits of turpentine, one quart of Venetian turpentine. Cut the wax in small pieces and pour the spirits over it–it will soon dissolve; then bottle. Apply with a flannel or soft cloth. It keeps the floors in excellent order.
Source: The Golden Age Cook Book, H. L. Dwight
Ring-worms
Rub mercurial ointment on the ring-worm previous to going to bed, and do not wash it off till morning. It will effect a cure if persevered in; sometimes in less than a week.
Source: Directions for Cookery, in its Various Branches, Eliza Leslie
Burns
Grated raw peeled potatoes spread on bandages and bound on a badly burned arm, shoulder and hand brought immediate relief to one of my children once when I was on a farm and could not get a doctor. I kept the bandages moist by binding fresh new, wet ones over the old ones until pain ceased but did not remove the dressing at all until wound was healed. It healed perfectly without leaving any scar. Do not know the merits of this remedy from a physician’s standpoint but it was used successfully in a bad hotel fire in a village where no physicians resided and the patients all recovered from severe burns and there were no scars left on their bodies.
Source: Civic League Cook Book
Mustard Poultice
Two ounces of dry mustard mixed with the whites of two eggs to a paste. Spread on a cloth in a thick paste and apply while it is fresh and wet.
Source: Civic League Cook Book
Orange Flower Lotion for the Complexion
Dissolve a slightly heaping tablespoonful of Epsom salts in a pint of imported orange flower water (Chiris de Grasse), and add to it one tablespoonful of witch hazel. Apply with a soft linen cloth. Very refreshing in warm weather and an excellent remedy for oiliness of the skin.
Source: The Golden Age Cook Book, H. L. Dwight
Lip Salve
Put into a wide-mouthed bottle four ounces of the best olive oil, with one ounce of the small parts of alkanet root. Stop up the bottle, and set it in the sun, (shaking it often,) till you find the liquid of a beautiful crimson. Then strain off the oil very clear from the alkanet root, put it into an earthen pipkin, and add to it an ounce of white wax, and an ounce and a half of the best mutton suet, which has been previously clarified, or boiled and skimmed. Set the mixture on the embers of coals, and melt it slowly: stirring it well. After it has simmered slowly far a little while, take it off; and while still hot, mix with it a few drops of oil of roses, or of oil of neroli, or tincture of musk.
Source: Directions for Cookery, in its Various Branches, Eliza Leslie