To Remove Moth Patches

Into a pint of rum put a tablespoonful of flour of sulphur. Apply this to the patches once a day, and they will disappear in two or three weeks.

Source: The White House Cookbook, F.L. Gillette

Scorched Clothes

Scorched clothes are often discarded as hopeless, but if not much burned may be made all right by the use of onion juice. Bake the onion and squeeze out the juice. Mix it with an ounce of fuller’s earth, a litle shredded soap and a wine glass of vinegar. Heat the mixture till the soap is dissolved. Then wait till it is cold before applying. Rub it well over the scorched place and leave to dry, then put the garment in the regular washing.

Source: 1001 Household Hints, Ottilie V. Ames

Burnet’s Celebrated Powder for the Face

Five cents’ worth of bay rum, five cents’ worth of magnesia snowflake, five cents’ worth of bergamot, five cents’ worth of oil of lemon; mix in a pint bottle and fill up with rain-water. Shake well, and apply with a soft sponge or cloth.

Source: The White House Cookbook, F.L. Gillette

Perspiration

For deodorizing — use a paste of borax and water.

Source: The Mary Frances First Aid Book, Jane Eayre Fryer

Cure for Pimples

One teaspoonful of carbolic acid and one pint of rose-water mixed is an excellent remedy for pimples. Bathe the skin thoroughly and often, but do not let the wash get into the eyes.

This wash is soothing to mosquito bites, and irritations of the skin of every nature.

It is advisable, in order to clear the complexion permanently, to cleanse the blood; then the wash would be of advantage.

To obtain a good complexion, a person’s diet should receive the first attention. Greasy food, highly spiced soups, hot bread and butter, meats or game, rich gravies, alcoholic liquors, coffee — all are injurious to the complexion. Strong tea used daily will after a time give the skin the color and appearance of leather. Coffee affects the nerves more, but the skin less, and a healthy nervous system is necessary to beauty. Eating between meals, late suppers, over-eating at meals, eating sweetmeats, candies, etc., all these tend to disorder the blood, producing pimples and blotches.

Washing of the face or skin is another consideration for a good complexion; it should be thoroughly washed in plenty of luke-warm water with some mild soap — then rinsed in clear water well; dry with a thick soft towel. If suds are left or wiped off the skin, the action of the air and sun will tan the surface, and permanently deface the complexion; therefore one should be sure to thoroughly rinse off all soap from the skin to avoid the tanning, which will leave a brown or yellow tinge impossible to efface.

Source: The White House Cookbook, F.L. Gillette

Dye for White or Light Eyebrows

Boil an ounce of walnut bark in a pint of water for an hour. Add a lump of alum the size of a filbert, and when cold, apply with a camel’s-hair brush.

Source: The White House Cookbook, F.L. Gillette

A Disinfecting Lamp

The following simple apparatus is most excellent for purifying rooms where any unpleasant effluvia prevails. Any person can fit up the lamp, and it is an agreeable method of overcoming bad odors in a sick room. Take a small glass lamp, such as is used for burning camphene or spirits, put in a clean wick, and fill it up with chloric ether and light the wick. In a few minutes the object will be accomplished.

In damp, dark cellars whore vegetables have decayed, or where drains allow the escape of mephitic gas, in dissecting rooms, and in any place where it is desirable to sweeten the atmosphere, one of these lamps will prove most efficacious. One tube filled with a wick is quite sufficient.

Source: Household Hints and Recipes, Henry T. Williams

Hair Wash

One penny’s worth of borax, half a pint of olive oil, one pint of boiling water.

Pour the boiling water over the borax and oil; let it cool; then put the mixture into a bottle. Shake it before using, and apply it with a flannel. Camphor and borax, dissolved in boiling water and left to cool, make a very good wash for the hair; as also does rosemary water mixed with a little borax. After using any of these washes, when the hair becomes thoroughly dry, a little pomatum or oil should be rubbed in to make it smooth and glossy–that is, if one prefers oil on the hair.

Source: The White House Cookbook, F.L. Gillette

To Remove Freckles

The following lotion is highly recommended: One ounce of lemon juice, a quarter of a drachm of powdered borax, and half a drachm of sugar; mix in a bottle, and allow them to stand a few days, when the liquor should be rubbed occasionally on the hands and face. Another application is: Friar’s balsam one part, rose-water twenty parts.

Powdered nitre moistened with water and applied to the face night and morning, is said to remove freckles without injury to the skin.

Also, a tablespoonful of freshly grated horse-radish, stirred into a cupful of sour milk; let it stand for twelve hours, then strain and apply often. This bleaches the complexion also, and takes off tan.

Source: The White House Cookbook, F.L. Gillette

Macassar Oil for the Hair

Renowned for the past fifty years, is as follows: Take a quarter of an ounce of the chippings of alkanet root, tie this in a bit of coarse muslin and put it in a bottle containing eight ounces of sweet oil; cover it to keep out the dust; let it stand several days; add to this sixty drops of tincture of cantharides, ten drops of oil of rose, neroli and lemon each sixty drops; let it stand one week and you will have one of the most powerful stimulants for the growth of the hair ever known.

Another:–To a pint of strong sage tea, a pint of bay rum and a quarter of an ounce of the tincture of cantharides, add an ounce of castor oil and a teaspoonful of rose, or other perfume. Shake well before applying to the hair, as the oil will not mix.

Source: The White House Cookbook, F.L. Gillette