To Prevent Horses’ Feet from Scalding or Cracking

Coat the hoofs once a week with an ointment consisting of equal parts of soap fat, yellow wax, linseed oil, Venice turpentine, and Norway tar; melt the wax separately before mixing.

Source: The Unrivalled Cook-Book and Housekeeper’s Guide, Mrs Washington

Tooth Powder

Take pulverized chalk, and twice as much charcoal; make very fine, and add castile soap suds and spirits of camphor to make a thick paste. Apply with the finger and brush.

Source: The Kansas Home Cook-Book

To Soften The Hands

To soften the hands: One can have the hands in soap-suds with soft soap without injury to the skin if the hands are dipped in vinegar or lemon juice immediately after. The acids destroy the corrosive effects of the alkali, and make the hands soft and white. Indian meal and vinegar or lemon juice used on hands where roughened by cold or labor will heal and soften them. Rub the hands in this, then wash off thoroughly and rub in glycerine. Those who suffer from chapped hands will find this comforting.

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

Cure for a Felon

Mix well one teaspoonful of burnt salt, one teaspoonful of Indian meal, and the yolk of one egg, ten drops of spirits of turpentine, a small quantity of home made lye soap, shaved fine. Apply as a poultice for twenty-four hours. If applied early, it will certainly effect a cure.

Source: Audel’s Household Helps, Hints and Receipts

Milk of Roses

This is a cosmetic. Pound an ounce of almonds in a mortar very finely; then put in shavings of honey soap in a small quantity. Add enough rose-water to enable you to work the composition with the pestle into a fine cream; and in order that it may keep, add to the whole an ounce of spirits of wine, by slow degrees. Scent with otto of roses. Strain through muslin. Apply to the face with a sponge or a piece of lint.

Source: The Ladies’ Book Of Useful Information

Cleopatra’s Freckle Balm

A splendid article. Venice soap, one ounce; lemon juice, half ounce; oil of bitter almonds, quarter ounce; deliquidated oil of tartar, quarter ounce; oil of rhodium, three drops. Dissolve the soap in the lemon juice, then add the two oils, and put the whole in the sun till it acquires the consistency of ointment, and then add the oil rhodium. Anoint the freckly face at night with this balm, and wash in the morning with pure water.

Source: The Ladies’ Book Of Useful Information

The Jaundice

Wear leaves of Celendine upon and under the feet.

Or take a small pill of Castile-soap every morning, for eight or ten days. Tried.

Or beat the white of an Egg thin; take it morning and evening in a glass of water.

Or half a pint of strong decoction of Nettles. Or of Burdock-leaves, morning and evening.

Or boil three ounces of Burdock-root in two quarts of water to three pints. Drink a tea-cupful of this every morning.

Source: Primitive Physic: or an easy and natural method of curing most diseases, John Wesley.

Anti-Dyspeptic Pills

Take Socotrine aloes, two drams; colocynth, gamboge, rhubarb, and castile soap, each one dram; cayenne, thirty grains; oil cloves, thirty drops. Make into one hundred and twenty pills with extract of gentian or dandelion. Dose: For dyspepsia, inactive liver or costiveness, one or two pills once a day; as a cathartic, three to five pills at a dose. This is a splendid pill. It cleanses the stomach, gives tone and energy to the digestive organs, restores the appetite, excites the liver and other secretory organs, without causing any debility.

Source: The Ladies’ Book Of Useful Information

Chafing, Good Home Remedy for

“Usually all that is required is washing the parts well with castile soap and cold water, and anointing with plain vaselin,” This remedy is always at hand, and is one to be relied upon. Vaselin, as we all know, is very healing.

Source: Mother’s Remedies: Over One Thousand Tried and Tested Remidies from Mothers of the United States and Canada, T. J. Ritter

Sprains, Turpentine Liniment for

“Equal parts of spirits of turpentine and vinegar and the yolk of one egg make a valuable liniment in cases of sprains, bruises and rheumatism poultice. Take common salt, roast it on a hot stove till dry as possible. Take one teaspoonful each of dry salt, venice turpentine and pulverized castile soap. Excellent for felon, apply twice daily until open.” This is a very good liniment and if applied often will draw, which is one of the essential things for a felon.

Source: Mother’s Remedies: Over One Thousand Tried and Tested Remidies from Mothers of the United States and Canada, T. J. Ritter