Changing Wigs and Chignons.--Matching Braids.--Frizzing the
Hair.--Crimping-pins.--Blonde Hair-pins.--What Colors
Hair.--Bleaching Tresses.--Sulphur Paste.--Foxy Locks.--Freshening
Switches.
The secret of content for most women is not perfection, but change.
They can not even be satisfied with their looks long at a time; but
Mary, Queen of Hearts as well as Scots, must draw an auburn wig
over her luxurious tresses, dark and smelling of violets, for which
regal-haired Elizabeth would have given the ruffs out of her best
gowns, and her recipe for yellow starch with them. The “pretty Miss
Vavasour,” who changed her chignon every morning with her costume,
was a type of the fickle beauties of the day, who are always better
satisfied with some other woman’s style than their own. Women of
intelligence send urgent requests for something to change the color of
their hair, either to make the front locks match the châtelaine braid,
or to bleach it outright. Fair blondes, whose sunny locks have been
their pride, find with dismay that this infantile tinge, which makes a
woman look so young and charming, is deepening into mature ash-brown--a
shade with no prestige or attraction whatever. In their exact eyes it
is mortifying to wear a blonde braid several degrees lighter than the
crown tresses. These last are growing, and constantly change, while the
ends keep their early tinge. Very few light-haired people pass from
youth to middle age without such a change. But, unless the difference
is very startling, it may be made agreeable by skillfully dressing
the hair. Light or varied hair should be crimped or waved, when its
tints will appear like the play of light and shade. Contrary to all
writers on this point, I contend that crimping does not necessarily
injure the hair. If it is killed--pulled out by the roots, or broken by
frizzing--the blame is due to careless or ignorant dressing. My own
hair was dressed regularly twice or thrice a week with hot irons for
years, and it never grew so fast or was in such a satisfactory state.
It was thoroughly combed and brushed, kept clean by weekly washing,
and each time it went under the curling-tongs it came out moist and
stimulated by the heat. The reason was, the clever French coiffeur
knew his business, and never allowed the hot iron to come directly in
contact with the hair. Each lock was done up in papillotes, and then
pinched with irons as hot as could be without scorching. Stiff hair may
be trained to curl by long and patient treatment with hot irons, and
be all the better for it. The secret of safe hair-dressing is never to
pull the hair, never scorch, and always wrap a lock in paper before
applying the iron. Common round curling-irons and frizzing-tongs may
be safety used if thin Manilla paper is folded once around them. So
in crimping: the hair may be done up on stout crimping-pins held by
slides, or braided in and out of a loop of thick cord, a bit of thin
paper folded over the crimp, and the pinching-iron used with safety
every day, provided the hair is not pulled too tight in braiding it.
The country method, where friseur’s irons are unknown, is to lay the
head on a table, and set a hot smoothing-iron on the woven lock--an
awkward but efficient process. It is not good to put the hair up on
metal pins or hair-pins overnight for two reasons: the perspiration
of the head will rust the pins, insensibly, so that they will cut the
hair; and the contact of iron with the sulphurous gas given out by hair
during sleep tends to darken and render the color displeasing. Rubber
crimping-pins, fastened by a rubber catch, are a late invention, and a
great improvement. But a loop of thick elastic cord is better than any
thing. The hair is woven in and out as on a hair-pin, the elastic holds
it when the fingers are withdrawn, and it is pleasanter to sleep in
than half a dozen stiff pins. I know more than one piquant little lady
whose “naturally” waving tresses are the admiration of her friends by
this simple means; and as the process has gone on for years without
lessening the flow of ruffled hair, it must be conceded that crimping
does not always hurt it. Iron hair-pins hurt the head more than a
generation of friseurs. The latest accusation against them is that they
draw off the healthy electricity of the head; and to a generation which
complains of paralysis from using steel pens, and uses patent glass
insulators for the legs of its bedsteads, this will seem no frivolous
charge. The patent insulators are a fact. Their use is advised by
medical men for all neuralgic, rheumatic, and sleepless people, and
one of the largest glass firms in New York makes their manufacture a
specialty. The patent and perfect hair-pin is not yet invented. Rubber
pins are clumsy if harmless, but there are gilt hair-pins made of a
yellow composition metal which are pleasanter to use than common ones,
and very becoming in blonde hair. Dark-haired people must stick to the
rubber pins, or at least see that their black ones are well japanned,
so as not to cut their locks.
Now, to give an opinion about the change of hair, we must know
something of its nature, and what colors it. Wise men say that light
hair is owing to an abundance of sulphur in the system, and dark hair
to an excess of iron. So if we comb light or red locks with lead combs
for a long time, the lead acts on the sulphureted hydrogen evolved by
the hair, and darkens it. If we can neutralize the iron in any way, a
contrary effect will be obtained. To do this, work at the dark hair
precisely as if it were an ink-spot to be taken out. The skin should
not suffer, and to prevent this, oil it carefully along the parting,
edges, and crown of the head, wiping the oil from the hair with a soft
cloth. Oxalic acid, strong and hot, is the best thing to take out spots
of ink made with iron, and we may try this with the hair. To apply
this, or any of the preparations named, one should be in undress,
wearing not a single article whose destruction would be of account,
for all the acids and bleaching powders used ruin clothes if a drop
touch them, taking the color out, and eating holes in the stoutest
fabrics. The eyelids and brows should be well oiled to prevent the acid
from attacking them, and the hands, shoulders, and face will be the
better for similar protection. On one ounce of pure, strong oxalic acid
pour one pint of boiling water, and, as soon as the hands can bear it,
wet the head with a sponge, not sapping it, but moistening thoroughly.
The effect may be hastened by holding the head in strong sunlight, or
over a register, or the steam of boiling water. Five minutes ought to
show a decided change, but if it do not, wet again and again, allowing
the acid to remain as long as it does not eat the skin. This may not be
hard to bear, but it will make the hair fall out.
Another mode is to cover the hair with a paste of powdered sulphur
and water, and sit in the sun with it for several hours. The Venetian
ladies used to steep their tresses in caustic solutions, and sit in
their balconies in the sun all day, bleaching it; and yet another day,
that the same rays might turn it yellow. Perhaps they gained by their
folly in one way what they lost in another, for such an airing and
sunning would benefit the health of any woman. A paste of bisulphate of
magnesia and lime is very effectual for bleaching the hair; but it must
be used with great caution not to burn hair, skin, and brains together.
The moment it begins seriously to attack the skin it should be washed
off in three waters, with lemon juice or vinegar in the last one to
neutralize the alkali. These pastes are recommended to turn ash-colored
hair light. To bleach dark hair is a long and tedious process, and
such an utter piece of foolery that I do not care to recount the
directions for it. The desire to change the color of the hair can only
be justified when it is of a dull and sickly appearance, and this is
best mended by improving the general health. Hair can not be glossy,
rich-colored, and thick unless the bodily vigor is what it should
be. Indeed, hair is one of the surest indexes to the state of health.
Scorched and foxy locks are a sign of neglect and of bad secretions.
Brushing remedies the first condition, hygiene the next. But among
the varieties of treatment specially appropriate to restoration of
the hair, sulphur vapor-baths must once more be mentioned. Doses of
sulphur, taken in Dotheboys’ fashion weekly, with molasses, will be
of service in keeping the blood pure, and in time will affect the
hair; but this powerful agent should not be used without advice of a
physician, and the dose should be always followed by simple purgatives,
like mustard-seed, figs, or prunes, eaten freely. Chlorines and
chlorides are specifics for bleaching hair, but they turn it gray or
white, and the yellow tinge is dyed afterward. Sulphurous applications
are the safest, if common caution is used not to take cold afterward or
to breathe any fumes from them.
Switches that have lost freshness may be very much improved by dipping
them into common ammonia without dilution. Half a pint is enough for
the purpose. The life and color of the hair is revived as if it were
just cut from the head. This dipping should be repeated once in three
months, to free the switch from dust, as well as to insure safety from
parasitic formations. The subject of coloring the hair will be spoken
of in another chapter.