Procure at a druggists, one drachm of oil of lavender, the same
quantity of oil of lemon, of oil of rosemary, and of oil of cinnamon;
with two drachms of oil of bergamot, all mixed in the same phial, which
should be a new one. Shake the oils well, and pour them into a pint of
spirits of wine. Cork the bottle tightly, shake it hard, and it will
be fit for immediate use; though it improves by keeping. You may add
to the oils, if you choose, ten drops of the tincture of musk, or ten
drops of extract of ambergris.
For very fine cologne water, mix together in a new phial oil of
lemon, two drachms; oil of bergamot, two drachms; oil of lavender,
two drachms; oil of cedrat, one drachm; tincture of benzoin, three
drachms; neroli, ten drops; ambergris, ten drops; attar of roses, two
drops. Pour the mixture into a pint of spirits of wine; cork and shake
the bottle and set it away for use. Use only what is called absolute
alcohol.
Another receipt for cologne water is to mix with a pint of alcohol,
sixty drops or two large tea-spoonfuls of orange-flower water, and the
same quantity of the essential oils of lemon, lavender, and bergamot.
The alcohol should be inodorous.
LAVENDER WATER.--Mix two ounces of essential oil of lavender, and two
drachms of essence of ambergris, with a pint of spirits of wine; cork
the bottle, and shake it hard every day for a fortnight. Use absolute
alcohol.
HUNGARY WATER.--Mix together one ounce of oil of rosemary and two
drachms of essence of ambergris; add them to a pint of spirits of wine.
Shake it daily for a month, and then transfer it to small bottles.
ROSE VINEGAR.--Fill a stone or china jar with fresh rose leaves put in
loosely. Then pour on them as much of the best white wine vinegar as
the jar will hold. Cover it, and set it in the sun, or in some other
warm place for three weeks. Then strain it through a flannel bag, and
bottle it for use. This vinegar will be found very fine for salads, or
for any nice purposes.
THIEVES' VINEGAR.--Take a large handful of lavender blossoms, and the
same quantity of sage, mint, rue, wormwood and rosemary. Chop and mix
them well. Put them into a jar, with half an ounce of camphor that has
been dissolved in a little alcohol, and pour in three quarts of strong
clear vinegar. Keep the jar for two or three weeks in the hot sun, and
at night plunge it into a box of heated sand. Afterwards strain and
bottle the liquid, putting into each bottle a clove of garlic sliced.
To have it very clear, after it has been bottled for a week, you
should pour it off carefully from the sediment and filter it through
blotting paper. Then wash the bottles and return the vinegar to them.
It should be kept very tightly corked. It is used for sprinkling about
in sick-rooms; and also in close damp oppressive weather. Inhaling the
odour from a small bottle will frequently prevent faintness in a crowd.
It is best to make it in June.
This vinegar is so called from an old tradition, that during the
prevalence of the plague in London the composition was invented by
four thieves, who found it a preservative from contagion; and were by
that means enabled to remain in the city and exercise their profession
to great advantage, after most of the inhabitants had fled.
OIL OF FLOWERS.--A French process for obtaining essential oils from
flowers or herbs has been described as follows:--Take carded cotton,
or split wadding, and steep it in some pure Florence oil, such as is
quite clear and has no smell. Then place a layer of this cotton in the
bottom of a deep china dish, or in an earthen pipkin. Cover it with a
thick layer of fresh rose leaves, or the leaves of sweet pink, jasmine,
wall-flower, tuberose, magnolia blossoms, or any other odoriferous
flower or plant from which you wish to obtain the perfume. Spread over
the flower-leaves another layer of cotton that has been steeped in oil.
Afterwards a second layer of flowers, and repeat them alternately till
the vessel is quite full. Cover it closely, and let it stand in the sun
for a week. Then throw away the flower-leaves, carefully press out the
oil from the cotton, and put it into a small bottle for use. The oil
will be found to have imbibed the odour of the flowers.
Keep the scented cotton to perfume your clothes-drawers.
BALM OF GILEAD OIL.--Put loosely into a bottle as many balm of Gilead
flowers as will come up to a third part of its height; then nearly fill
up the bottle with sweet oil, which should be of the best quality.
Let it infuse (shaking it occasionally) for several days, and it will
then be fit for use. It is considered a good remedy for bruises of
the skin; also for cuts, burns, and scalds that are not very bad, and
should be applied immediately by wetting a soft rag with it; renewing
it frequently.
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 for 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.
COLD CREAM.--Cut up a shilling cake of white wax; put it into a
clean sauce-pan with an ounce of oil of sweet almonds, and two large
table-spoonfuls of lard. Boil and stir it well. When you take it off
the fire, beat in an ounce of orange-flower, or rose-water. Put it up
in gallicups with covers.
SOFT POMATUM.--Soak half a pound of fresh lard and a quarter of a pound
of beef marrow in water for two or three days; squeezing and pressing
it every day, and changing the water. Afterwards drain off the water,
and put the lard and marrow into a sieve to dry. Then transfer it to a
jar, and set the jar into a pot of boiling water. When the mixture is
melted, put it into a basin, and beat it with two spoonfuls of brandy.
Then drain off the brandy, perfume the pomatum by mixing with it any
scented essence that you please, and tie it up in gallipots.
COSMETIC PASTE.--Take a quarter of a pound of Castile soap, and cut it
into small pieces. Then put it into a tin or porcelain sauce-pan, with
just water enough to moisten it well, and set it on hot coals. Let it
simmer till it is entirely dissolved; stirring it till it becomes a
smooth paste, and thickening it with Indian meal, (which even in a raw
state is excellent for the hands.) Then take it from the fire, and when
cool scent it with rose-water, or with any fragrant essence you please.
Beat and stir it hard with a silver spoon, and when it is thoroughly
mixed put it into little pots with covers.
ACID SALT.--This is the composition commonly, but erroneously called
salt of lemon, and is excellent for removing ink and other stains
from the hands, and for taking ink spots out of white clothes. Pound
together in a marble mortar an ounce of salt of sorrel, and an ounce
of the best cream of tartar, mixing them thoroughly. Then put it in
little wooden boxes or covered gallipots, and rub it on your hands when
they are stained, washing them in cold water, and using the acid salt
instead of soap; a very small quantity will immediately remove the
stain. In applying it to linen or muslin that is spotted with ink or
fruit juice, hold the stained part tightly stretched over a cup or bowl
of boiling water. Then with your finger rub on the acid salt till the
stain disappears. It must always be done before the article is washed.
This mixture costs about twenty-five cents, and the above quantity (if
kept dry) will be sufficient, for a year or more.
Ink stains may frequently be taken out of white clothes by rubbing on
(before they go to the wash) some bits of cold tallow picked from the
bottom of a mould candle. Leave the tallow sticking on in a lump, and
when the article comes from the wash, it will generally be found that
the spot has disappeared. This experiment is so easy and so generally
successful that it is always worth trying. When it fails, it is in
consequence of some peculiarity in the composition of the ink.
SWEET JARS.--Take a china jar, and put into it three handfuls of fresh
damask rose-leaves; three of sweet pinks, three of wall-flowers, and
stock gilly-flowers, and equal proportions of any other fragrant
flowers that you can procure. Place them in layers; strewing powdered
orris-root thickly between each layer.
You may fill another jar with equal quantities of lavender, knotted
marjoram, rosemary, lemon-thyme, balm of Gilead, lemon-peel, and
smaller quantities of laurel leaves and mint; and some sliced
orris-root. You may mix with the herbs, (which must all be chopped,)
powdered cloves, cinnamon, and nutmeg; strewing powdered orris-root
between the layers.
Flowers, herbs, and spice may all be mixed in the same jar; adding
always some orris root. Every thing that is put in should be perfectly
free from damp.
The jar should be kept closely covered, except when the cover is
occasionally removed for the purpose of diffusing the scent through the
room.
SCENTED BAGS.--Take a quarter of a pound of coriander seeds, a quarter
of a pound of orris root, a quarter of a pound of aromatic calamus,
a quarter of a pound of damask rose leaves, two ounces of lavender
blossoms, half an ounce of mace, half an ounce of cinnamon, a quarter
of an ounce of cloves, and two drachms of musk-powder. Beat them all
separately in a mortar, and then mix them well together. Make small
silk or satin bags; fill each with a portion of the mixture, and sew
them closely all round. Lay them among your clothes in the drawers.
VIOLET PERFUME.--Drop twelve drops of genuine oil of rhodium on a lump
of loaf-sugar. Then pound the sugar in a marble mortar with two ounces
of orris root powder. This will afford an excellent imitation of the
scent of violets. If you add more oil of rhodium, it will produce a
rose perfume. Sew up the powder in little silk bags, or keep it in a
tight box.
DURABLE INK.--Take, when empty, one of the little bottles that has
contained indelible ink, such as is sold in cases, and wash and rinse
it clean. Put into it two inches of lunar caustic; fill it up with soft
water and cork it tightly. This is the marking ink.
Prepare the larger bottle that has contained the liquid used for the
first wash, by making it quite clean. Take a large tea-spoonful of salt
of tartar, and a lump of gum arabic the size of a hickory nut. Put them
into the wash bottle, and fill it up with clear rain water. Cork both
bottles tightly, and set them three days in the sun. Always put them in
the sun before using it.
Linen cannot be marked well with durable ink unless the weather is
clear and dry. Dip a camel's hair pencil in the large bottle that
contains the gum liquid, and wash over with it a small space on a
corner of the linen, about large enough to contain the name. Dry it in
the sun, and let it alone till next day. Then take a very good pen,
and with the ink from the smallest bottle, write the name you intend,
on the place that has been prepared by the first liquid. This also must
be dried in the sun. See that the bottles are always well corked, and
keep them in a covered box.
After the linen is dried, iron it before you write on it.
ANOTHER DURABLE INK.--For the marking liquid--rub together in a small
mortar five scruples of lunar caustic with one drachm of gum arabic,
one scruple of sap-green and one ounce of rain water. Keep the bottle
three days in the sun.
For wetting the linen--mix together a quarter of an ounce of salt of
soda, a heaped table-spoonful of powdered gum arabic, and two ounces of
hot water.
TO KEEP PEARL-ASH.--Take three ounces of pearl-ash, and put it into a
clean black bottle with a pint and a half (not more) of soft water. The
proportion is an ounce of pearl-ash to half a pint of water. Cork it
very tightly, shake it, and it will be fit for use as soon as all the
pearl-ash is dissolved. A table-spoonful of this liquid is equal to a
small tea-spoonful of pearl-ash in the lump or powder. Keeping it ready
dissolved will be found very convenient.
ALMOND PASTE.--Blanch half a pound of shelled sweet almonds, and a
quarter of a pound of bitter ones, and beat them in a mortar to a
smooth paste--adding by degrees a jill of rose or orange-flower water.
Then beat in, gradually, half a pound of clear strained honey. When the
whole is well incorporated, put it into gallipots, pouring on the top
of each some orange-flower or rose-water. Keep it closely covered.
This is a celebrated cosmetic for the hands.