To prepare flowers so that their beauty will remain unimpaired for years. Roses and other flowers can be had to last for years by this beautiful art. The process is very easy, and the directions are so simple that a child may follow them.

Chapter thirteen treats of Home Decoration.

It teaches how to arrange a house so as to furnish it cheaply and harmoniously. It gives complete instructions for every room-Hall, Parlor, Library, Dining-room, Bedrooms, etc., and attends to every detail. This is a splendid guide to all who wish to make their home attractive.

Chapter fourteen teaches all about caring for House Plants. It tells the right temperature to keep them in; the proper soil for potting; how to make plants grow luxuriantly; how to have plenty of blossoms; to keep plants without a fire at night; to destroy bugs and rose-slugs; to raise plants with the least trouble; the best varieties of plants to raise, etc.

It tells how to preserve autumn leaves so that they can be bent in any form desired, and so that they will retain their color.

It tells how to prepare skeleton leaves-a very pretty amus.e.m.e.nt.

Chapter fifteen is devoted to The Laundry.

It tells: How to make washing fluid; to take out scorch; to make plain, fine, and coffee starch; to make enamel for shirt bosoms, so that any housekeeper can do them up as nicely as they do at the laundry; to clean velvets and ribbons; to take grease out of silks, woolens, paper, floors, etc.; to take out fruit stains; to take out iron rust and mildew; to wash woolen goods and blankets so that they will not shrink, etc.

The sixteenth chapter teaches how to do all kinds of Stamping.

In this chapter are given full instructions for wet and dry stamping; for making stamping powder; how to mix white paint for dark goods, and dark paint for light goods; it tells how to prepare all the necessary articles for stamping; how to prepare transfer paper; how to transfer any pattern you may see; how to make a distributor; how to enlarge designs; how to prepare all kinds of stamping powder; how to do French indelible stamping; what kind of a brush to use; and how to care for patterns. If the directions here given are followed the stamping will always be satisfactory.

Chapter seventeen teaches how to do Bronze Work.

Bronzing is the latest improvement in wax work, and if properly made cannot be detected from the most expensive, artistic bronze. It is used for table, mantel and bracket ornaments, and may be exposed to dust and air without sustaining the slightest injury. It can be dusted like any piece of furniture, and makes a very desirable, inexpensive ornament. The colors it is made in are Gold, Silver, Copper, Fire, and Green Bronze. Among the articles described are a vase in bronze, a motto in bronze, a floral basket in bronze, animals and birds in bronze, statuary in bronze, flowers and leaves in bronze.

The art of making each of the above articles is carefully described so that any one can follow the directions.

The art of Decalcomania is also taught in this chapter. This is used upon almost everything for which ornamentation is required, such as Crockery, China, Porcelain, Vases, Gla.s.s, Bookcases, Folios, Boxes, Lap desks, Ribbons, etc. It is a very pretty art, and is much admired.

Chapter eighteen gives twelve recipes for articles needed in every household. It will tell you how to save a large percentage of household expenses, and also how to have a great many of the articles you use in your daily housework of a superior quality, vastly better than the ones you are using at the present time.

It is a fact not generally known, that a great many of the articles used in daily household work cost little more than one-tenth of the price the consumer pays. We purpose to show the readers of this book how to have, in most instances, better articles than those they buy, for a small percentage of the cost. To do this, we have, by our own personal investigation, gathered a number of valuable recipes together, and have paid for the privilege of using them.

We give in "The Ladies' Book of Useful Information" twelve recipes which have never before been published, and which, if you once possess, you will never wish to be without, as they are truly valuable secrets.

The list is as follows: Healing salve; Magnetic croup cure; Worm elixir; Brilliant self-shining stove polish; Wonderful starch enamel; Royal washing powder; Magic annihilator; I X L baking powder; Electric powder; French polish or dressing for leather; Artificial honey.

It also contains a list of all the poisons and their antidotes. It describes the symptoms of poisoning and how to proceed in each case.

CHAPTER I.

PERSONAL BEAUTY.

Treating of the Care of the Skin, Hair, Teeth, and Eyes, so as to have each arrive at the highest degree of beauty of which each is capable.

A great object of importance, of care to every lady, is the care of her complexion. There is nothing more pleasing to the eye than a delicate, smooth skin; and besides being pleasing to the eye, is an evidence of health, and gives additional grace to the most regular features. The choice of soaps has considerable influence in promoting and maintaining this desideratum. These should invariably be selected of the finest kinds, and used sparingly, and never with cold water, for the alkali which, more or less, mingles in the composition of all soaps has an undoubted tendency to irritate a delicate skin; warm water excites a gentle perspiration, thereby a.s.sisting the skin to throw off those natural secretions which, if allowed to remain, are likely to acc.u.mulate below the skin and produce roughness, pimples, and even eruptions of an obstinate and unpleasant character. Those soaps which ensure a moderate fairness and flexibility of the skin are the most desirable for regular use.

Pomades, when properly prepared, contribute in an especial manner to preserve the softness and elasticity of the skin, their effect being of an emollient and congenial nature; and, moreover, they can be applied on retiring to rest, when their effects are not liable to be disturbed by the action of the atmosphere, muscular exertions or nervous influences.

The use of paints has been very correctly characterized as "a species of corporeal hypocrisy as subversive of delicacy of mind as it is of the natural complexion," and has been, of late years, discarded at the toilette of every lady.

The use of cosmetics has been common in all ages and in every land.

Scripture itself records the painting of Jezebel; and Ezekiel, the prophet, speaks of the eye-painting common among the women; and Jeremiah, of rending the face with painting-a most expressive term for the destruction of beauty by such means. For the surest destroyers of real beauty are its simulators. The usurper destroys the rightful sovereign.

That paint can ever deceive people, or really add beauty for more than the duration of an acted charade or play, when "distance lends enchantment to the view," is a delusion; but it is one into which women of all times and nations have fallen-from the painted Indian squaw to the rouged and powdered denizen of London or Paris.

Milk was the favorite cosmetic of the ladies of ancient Rome. They applied plasters of bread and a.s.s's milk to their faces at night, and washed them off with milk in the morning.

As a cosmetic, milk would be harmless, but we doubt its power of improving the skin. As a beverage, no doubt, it whitens the complexion more than any other food.

But before we speak of improving the complexion, it will be well to explain to our readers the nature and properties of the skin.

This is what an American physician has recently told us about it:-

THE SKIN-ITS BEAUTY, USES, CONSTRUCTION, MANAGEMENT, ETC.

Every person knows what the skin is, its external appearance, and its general properties; but there are many of my readers who may not be aware of its peculiar and wonderful construction, its compound character, and its manifold uses. It not merely acts as an organ of sense, and a protection to the surface of the body, but it clothes it, as it were, in a garment of the most delicate texture and of the most surpa.s.sing loveliness. In perfect health it is gifted with exquisite sensibility, and while it possesses the softness of velvet, and exhibits the delicate hues of the lily, the carnation, and the rose, it is nevertheless gifted with extraordinary strength and power of resisting external injury, and is not only capable of repairing, but of actually renewing itself. Though unprotected with hair, wool or fur, or with feathers or scales, as with the brute creation, the human skin is furnished with innumerable nerves, which endow it with extreme susceptibility to all the various changes of climate and of weather, and prompt the mind to provide suitable materials, in the shape of clothing, to shield it under all the circ.u.mstances in which it can be placed.

The importance of the due exposure of the body to daylight or sunlight cannot be too strongly insisted on. Light and warmth are powerful agents in the economy of our being. The former especially is an operative agent on which health, vigor, and even beauty itself, depend. Withdraw the light of the sun from the organic world, and all its various beings and objects would languish and gradually lose those charms which are now their characteristics. In its absence, the carnation tint leaves the cheek of beauty, the cherry hue of the lips changes to a leaden-purple, the eyes become gla.s.sy and expressionless, and the complexion a.s.sumes an unnatural, cadaverous appearance that speaks of sickness, night and death. So powerful is daylight, so necessary to our well-being, that even its partial exclusion, or its insufficient admission to our apartments, soon tells its tale in the feeble health, the liability to the attacks of disease, and the pallid features (vacant and sunken, or flabby, pendent and uninviting) of their inmates. Even the aspect of the rooms in which we pa.s.s most of our time, and the number and extent of their windows, is perceptible, by the trained eye, in the complexion and features of those that occupy them. So in the vegetable world-the bright and endlessly varied hues of flowers, and their sweet perfumes-even their very production-depend on sunlight. In obscure light plants grow lanky and become pale and feeble. They seldom produce flowers, and uniformly fail to ripen their seeds. In even partial darkness the green hue of their foliage gradually pales and disappears, and new growths, when they appear, are blanched or colorless.

The best method of keeping the skin clean and healthy, by ablution and baths, may here be alluded to. The use of these, and the washing of the skin that forms part of the daily duties of the toilet, appear to be very simple matters, but writers on the subject differ in opinion as to the methods to be followed to render them perfect cleansers of the skin. Some of them regard the use of soap and water applied in the form of lather with the hands, and afterwards thoroughly removed from the skin by copious affusions, rinsing or sluicing with water, or immersion in it, as the best method. This is probably the case when the skin is not materially dirty, or its pores or surface obstructed or loaded with the residual solid matter of the perspiration or its own unctuous exudation and exuviae. To remove these completely and readily, something more than simple friction with the smooth hand is generally required. In such cases the use of a piece of flannel or serge, doubled and spread across the hand, or of a mitten of the same material, will be most ready and effective. Friction with this-first with soap, and afterwards with water to wash the soap off-will be found to cleanse the skin more thoroughly and quickly than any other method, and, by removing the worn-out portion of its surface, to impart to it a healthy glow and hue that is most refreshing and agreeable. This effect will be increased by wiping and rubbing the surface thoroughly dry with a coa.r.s.e and moderately rough, but not a stiff, towel, instead of with the fine, smooth diapers which are now so commonly employed. At the bath, the fleshbrush usually provided there will supersede the necessity of using the flannel.

The small black spots and marks frequently observed on the skin in hot weather, particularly on the face, generally arise from the acc.u.mulation of the indurated solid matter of the perspiration in its pores. When they a.s.sume the form of small pimples (_acne punctata_), and often when otherwise, they may be removed by strong pressure between the fingers, or between the nails of the opposite fingers, followed by the use of hot, soapy water.

The subsequent daily application of a weak solution of bichloride of mercury-as in the form commonly known as Gowland's lotion-or of sulphate of zinc, will completely remove the swelling, and generally prevent their re-formation.

=Eruptions= are too well known to need any lengthy description here.

They are usually cla.s.sified, by writers on the subject, into: animalcular eruptions, or those due to the presence of animalcula (minute acari) in the scarfskin, which occasion much irritation, and of which the itch furnishes a well-marked example; papular eruptions, or dry pimples; pustular eruptions, or mattery pimples, of which some forms are popularly known as crusted tetters; scaly eruptions, or dry tetters; and vesicular eruptions, or watery pimples.

The treatment of all of the above, except the first, in simple cases, where there is not much const.i.tutional disarrangement, consists mainly in attention to the general principles of health, cleanliness, exercise, food, ventilation, and clothing. Occasional doses of mild saline aperients (Epsom salts, cream of tartar, or phosphate of soda, or of sulphur combined with cream of tartar) should be taken, and warm or tepid bathing, preferably in sea-water, or, if not convenient, rain water, frequently had recourse to. Stimulants of all kinds should be avoided, and the red meats, ripe fruits, and the antis...o...b..tic vegetables should form a considerable portion of the diet. Lemonade, made by squeezing the juice of a lemon into a half-pint tumbler full of water, and sweetening with a little sugar, should be frequently and liberally taken as one of the best beverages in such cases. To relieve the itching and irritation (except in the pustular, crusted, and vesicular varieties), brisk friction with a fleshbrush or a fleshglove may be employed. The parts should also be wetted with an appropriate lotion after each friction or bath, or the use of soap and water.

In all the scaly eruptions, iodide of pota.s.sium internally, and ioduretted or sulphuretted lotions or baths are invaluable. In many of them of a malignant or obstinate character, as _Lepra Psoriasis_, _Lupus_, etc., small doses of solution of a.r.s.enite of pota.s.sa (liquor a.r.s.enicalis; the dose, from 3 to 5 drops, gradually and cautiously increased to 7 to 9 drops, twice a day, after a meal) prove highly serviceable. In the forms of psoriasis popularly called baker's itch, grocer's itch, and washer-woman's itch, the application of ointment of nitrate of mercury, diluted with ten or twelve times its weight of lard, has been highly recommended. A course of sarsaparilla is also in most cases advantageous.

The small, hard, distinct pimples-"acne, or acne simplex" of medical writers-that occur on the forehead, and occasionally on the temples and chin, generally yield to stimulating lotions, consisting of equal parts of strong vinegar, or spirit, and water, or to weak lotions of sulphate of zinc, a.s.sisted by occasional doses of cooling laxatives, as the salines, or a mixture of sulphur or cream of tartar.

=Freckles=, or the round or oval-shaped yellowish or brownish-yellow spots, resembling stains, common on the face and the backs of the hands of persons with a fair and delicate skin who are much exposed to the direct rays of the sun in hot weather, are of little importance in themselves, and have nothing to do with the general health. Ladies who desire to remove them may have recourse to the frequent application of dilute spirit, or lemon juice, or a lotion formed by adding acetic, hydrochloric, nitric, or sulphuric acid, or liquor of pota.s.sa, to water, until it is just strong enough to slightly p.r.i.c.k the tongue.

One part of good Jamaica rum to two parts of lemon juice or weak vinegar is a good form of lotion for the purpose. The effect of all these lotions is increased by the addition of a little glycerine.

The preceding are also occasionally called "common freckles," "summer freckles," and "sun freckles." In some cases they are very persistent, and resist all attempts to remove them while the exposure that produces them is continued. Their appearance may be prevented by the greater use of the veil, parasol or sunshade, or avoidance of exposure to the sun during the heat of the day.

Another variety, popularly known as cold freckles, occur at all seasons of the year, and usually depend on disordered health or some disturbance of the natural functions of the skin. Here the only external application that proves useful is the solution of bichloride of mercury and glycerine, or Gowland's lotion.

=The Itch=-"psora" and "scabies," of medical authors; the "gale" of the French,-already referred to, in its common forms is an eruption of minute vesicles, generally containing animalcula (acari), and of which the princ.i.p.al seats are between the fingers, bend of the wrist, etc.

It is, accompanied by intense itching of the parts affected, which is only aggravated by scratching. The usual treatment is with sulphur ointment (simple or compound) well rubbed in once or twice a day; a spoonful (more or less) of flowers of sulphur, mixed with treacle or milk, being taken at the same time, night and morning. Where the external use of sulphur is objectionable, on account of its smell, a sulphuretten bath or lotion, or one of chloride of lime, may be used instead. In all cases extreme cleanliness, with the free use of soap and water, must be strictly adhered to.