ater, 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 str