The Ladies Book of Useful Information by Anonymous (interesting novels in english TXT) 📖

and if the head or hair be very scurfy or dirty, or hard water be used, a few grains of soda (not potash or pearlash) may be advantageously added to the water. This will increase its detersive qualities. After the hair has been washed, which should be done quickly, though thoroughly, it should be freed as much as possible by pressure with the hands and then wiped with a soft, thick towel, which should be done with care, to avoid entangling it. After laying it straight, first with the coarse end of the dressing comb and then with the finer portion, it may be finally dressed.

In ordinary cases once every two or three weeks is often enough to wash the hair and head. The extreme length of ladies' hair will sometimes render the process of washing it very troublesome and inconvenient. In such cases the patient and assiduous use of a clean, good hairbrush, followed by washing the partings and the crown of the head with soap and water, may be substituted.

The occasional washing of the head is absolutely necessary to preserve the health of the scalp and the luxuriance and beauty of the hair when much oil, pomatum or other greasy substance is used in dressing it.

Medical writers have frequently pointed out the ill effects of the free or excessive use of oily or greasy articles for the hair; but their warnings appear to be unheeded by the mass of mankind. Some object to their use altogether. There are, however, exceptions to every rule, and some of these exceptions are noticed elsewhere in this volume. The ill effects referred to chiefly occur from their being used when not required, and in excess, and are aggravated by the neglect of thorough cleanliness.

To improve the growth and luxuriance of the hair, when languid or defective, the only natural and perfectly safe method that can be adopted is to promote the healthy action of the scalp by increasing the vigor of the circulation of the blood through its minute channels. For this purpose nothing is so simple and effective as gentle excitation of the skin by frequent continued friction with the hairbrush, which has the convenience of ease of application and inexpensiveness. The same object may be further promoted by the application of any simple cosmetic wash or other preparation that will gently excite or stimulate the skin or exercise a tonic action on it without clogging its pores. Strong rosemary water or rosemary tea, and a weak solution of the essential oil of either rosemary or garden thyme, are popular articles of this kind. They may be rendered more stimulating by the addition of a little ammonia or a little spirit, or both of them. The skin of the head should be moistened with these on each occasion of dressing the hair, and their diffusion and action promoted by the use of a clean hairbrush. Aromatized water, to which a very little tincture or vinegar of cantharides (preferably the former) has been added, may also be used in the same way, and is in high repute for the purpose. When the skin is pale, lax, and wrinkled, astringent washes may be used. Strong black tea is a convenient and excellent application of this kind. When the skin and hair are dry, and the latter also stiff and untractable, a little glycerine is an appropriate addition to each of the preceding washes or lotions. The occasional use of a little bland oil, strongly scented with oil of rosemary or of origanum, or with both of them, or with oil of mace, or very slightly tinctured with cantharides, is also generally very serviceable when there is poorness and dryness of the hair. When the hair is unnaturally greasy and lax (a defect that seldom occurs), the use of the astringent washes just referred to, or of a little simple oil slightly scented with the essential oil of bitter almonds, will tend to remove or lessen it.

All the articles named above promote the glossiness and waviness of the hair, and are also among the simplest, safest, and best applications that can be employed when the hair is weak and begins to fall off.

To impart some degree of curliness or waviness to the hair when it is naturally straight, and to render it more retentive of the curl imparted to it by papers or by other modes of dressing it, various methods are often adopted and different cosmetics employed. The first object appears to be promoted by keeping the hair for a time in a state intermediate between perfect dryness and humidity, from which different parts of its structure, being unequally affected in this respect, will acquire different degrees of relaxation and rigidity, and thus have a tendency to assume a wavy or slightly curly form, provided the hair be left loose enough to allow it. For this purpose nothing is better than washing the hair with soap and water, to which a few grains of salt of tartar (carbonate of potash) have been added; or it may be slightly moistened with any of the hair washes mentioned in the last paragraph, in each half-pint of which a few grains of the carbonate (say ten or twelve), or a teaspoonful of glycerine, has been dissolved. The moistened hair, after the application of the brush, should be finally loosely adjusted as desired with the dressing-comb. The effect occurs as the hair dries. When oils are preferable to hair washes, those strongly scented with the oil of rosemary, to which a few drops of oil of thyme or origanum may be added, appear to be the most useful.

To cause the hair to retain the position given to it in dressing it, various methods and cosmetics are commonly employed. When the arrangement is a natural one and the hair healthy and tractable, the free use of the hairbrush will usually be sufficient for the purpose. When this is insufficient, the application of a few drops of oil, or, better still, moistening the hair with a little simple water, will effect the object satisfactorily. In very elaborate and unnatural styles of dressing the hair, and to cause it to remain in curl or to retain its position during dancing, or violent exercise, bandoline and cosmetique or hard pomatum are the articles commonly employed in fashionable life. Mild ale or porter has a similar effect, and is often substituted for the preceding expensive cosmetics. The frequent use of any of these articles is objectionable, as they clog up the pores of the skin and shield both it and the hair from the genial action of the atmosphere, which is essential to their healthy vigor. They should, hence, be subsequently removed by carefully washing the head with a little soap and tepid water. Their use may be tolerated in dressing for the ballroom, but on no other occasion. Simple water skillfully employed, as noticed elsewhere, is the best and safest mixture, and under ordinary circumstances is amply sufficient for the purpose.

The practice of artificially changing the color of the hair, and particularly of dyeing it, has descended to us from remote antiquity, and though not so common in Western Europe as formerly, is still far from infrequent at the present day. This might be inferred from the multitude of nostrums for the purpose continually advertised in the newspapers, and from the number of persons who announce themselves as practicing the art, even though the keen and experienced eye did not frequently detect instances of it, as it now does, in the hair and beards of those we see around us. The recent rage after light auburn or reddish hair in fashionable life has, unfortunately, greatly multiplied these instances. The consideration of the subject, however, in its ethical relations does not come within the province of the present work, and I shall confine myself to pointing out how the color of the hair may be changed in the safest and most satisfactory manner.

To change the color of the hair various methods and preparations are employed. The principal of these are intended to darken it, but sometimes the contrary is aimed at. Whichever object is desired, it is necessary that the article or preparation employed to carry it out be not of a caustic or irritant nature, capable of injuriously affecting the delicate skin to which it is applied, or that it may be liable to come in contact with, as is the case with many of the nostrums vended for the purpose. Some of the substances that necessarily enter into the composition of hair strains and hair dyes, or that are used in connection with them, possess these objectionable properties in a high degree, and can, therefore, only be safely employed in a state of proper dilution and combination. If any doubt exists respecting such an article, it is a wise precaution to regard it with suspicion and to test its qualities before applying it for the first time. This may be done by placing some of it on the soft skin of the inner side of the wrist or fore-arm, and allowing it to remain there as long, and under the same conditions, as it is ordered to be left in contact with the hair or skin of the head or face. In this way the injury or loss of the hair, sores, and other serious consequences that too often follow the use of advertised and ill-prepared hair dyes may be generally avoided.

To gradually darken the shade of the hair on these principles, provided its normal sulphur be still secreted by the hair-bulbs and be still present in its structure, it will, therefore, generally be sufficient to occasionally employ a weak solution of any of the milder salts of iron as a hair wash. The menstruum may be water, to which a little spirits and a few drops of oil of rosemary to increase its stimulating qualities have been added. In applying it, the head being first washed clean, care should be taken to thoroughly moisten the whole surface of the hair and the skin of the head with the wash; and its absorption and action should be promoted by the free use of a clean hairbrush. Wine is the favorite solvent for the iron; ale and beer are also sometimes so employed. Most of the fashionable ferruginous hair washes also contain a few grains of acetate of copper or distilled verdigris, the objections to which have been already pointed out.

The daily use of oil or pomatum, with which a few grains of carbonate of lead, lead plaster, or trisnitrate of bismuth, have been blended by heat and careful trituration, has generally a like effect on the hair to ferruginous solutions; so also has a leaden comb, but its action is very uncertain. None of these last are, however, safe for long-continued use. Atrophy of the scalp, baldness, and even local paralysis, have sometimes, though rarely, been caused by them.

When the normal sulphur of the hair is absent, or deficient, the preceding substances fail to darken the hair. In this case the desired effect may often be produced by also moistening the head, say twice a week, with water, to which a little sulphuret of potassium or hydrosulphuret of ammonia has been added.

When it is desired to dye or darken the hair more rapidly, as in a few hours, or even a few minutes, plumbite of lime, plumbite of potassa, or nitrate or ammonia—nitrate of silver—is usually employed. The first is commonly produced by the admixture of quicklime with oxide of lead (litharge), carbonate of lead, or acetate of lead. These ingredients should be in appropriate proportions, but very generally the reverse is the case in those of the shops.

It may be laid down as a rule that when the lime is in greater proportion than about two to one of the oxide, and to the corresponding equivalents of