Toiling your whole life to be beautiful (and consequently powerful), but tired of lining your eyes with a pin dipped in lampblack after brightening them with a dropperful of perfume? Of course you are. We all are. There is a better way, free of the traditional harsh chemicals, using completely different harsh chemicals and ritualistic abrasions. In his 1889 Encyclopaedia of Astounding Facts and Useful Information, Barkham Burroughs instructs the women of his day “How to Be Handsome” and so “to govern, control, manage, influence, and retain the adoration of husbands, fathers, brothers, lovers or even cousins.”
Step one: Cleanse and remove skin
“Keep clean–wash freely, bathe regularly,” three times a week, Burroughs tells us. He specifically recommends against plunging into ice-cold water; rather, a hot bath with ammonia (which “cleans out the pores of the skin as well as any bleach will do”) or a sponge bath with a “flesh-brush” and “coarse toilet gloves” will do the job. “The most important part of a bath is the drying,” he tells us. “Every part of the body should be rubbed to a glowing redness, using a coarse crash towel at the finish.”
Step two: Poison your eyeballs
Brighter eyes can be attained by “dashing soapsuds into them.” To properly highlight your eyelashes, which are “worthless if not long and drooping,” you’ll want to “anoint the roots with a balsam made of two drachms of nitric oxid of mercury mixed with one of leaf lard.” Trim slightly every other day with tiny, sharp, eye-gougey scissors.
Step three: Avoid water
To keep hands soft and white (always white; white is very important), avoid putting them in water. “There are dozens of women with soft, white hands who do not put them in water once a month,” Burroughs tells us. Hard, dry skin can be scrubbed with tar soap, soaked in glycerine, and covered with gloves at bedtime; red hands can be combatted by soaking the feet in hot water. Burroughs knows “of one beautiful lady who has not washed her face for three years, yet it is always clean, rosy, sweet and kissable.”
Step four: For the love of God, don’t tell anyone
It’s no news to us that while we’re expected to suffer for the sake of beauty, we’re not meant to ever let a man know that we’re anything but low-maintenance and naturally gorgeous. And vaguely hygienic. Burroughs’s sweet, kissable lady learned this the hard way when she spilled her beauty secrets to her beloved gentleman. “Unfortunately, it proved to be her last gift to that gentleman, who declared in a subsequent note that ‘I can not reconcile my heart and my manhood to a woman who can get along without washing her face.’”
Step five: Dance naked in the sun.
Your thrice-weekly baths should be supplemented by daily “vapor baths” in the following manner:
Two facilitate this very beneficial practice, a south or east apartment is desirable. The lady denudes herself, takes a seat near the window, and takes in the warm rays of the sun. The effect is both beneficial and delightful. If, however, she be of a restless disposition, she may dance, instead of basking, in the sunlight.
Well, okay. That one might work.
(h/t Mental Floss)
How came the dancing naked in the sunshine has dropped out of fashion?
I personally would prefer to dance semi-naked with the help of a dance semi-naked support bra. Maybe it died because, ouch? I suppose maybe I could handle a naked waltz but not so much a naked jitterbug. Dancing fads could also be to blame.
What I would like to know is how to reconcile “dancing
nakeddenuded in the sun” with “soft white hands”. Should I wear gloves?Obviously if you are following his instructions you will automagically defy the laws of physics and the sun rays will bend around your hands so as not to spoil them. Silly question.
But how?? A woman shouldn’t even know about physics!!
Like I said, automagically. You don’t need to know the laws of physics, you just have to trust the man telling you how you should live your life.
And quantum physics is even counter-intuitive, making the intuitive ladybrain get the vapors every time it’s used to set up a thought experiment in quantum mechanics.
Errrr…. how do you take a bath three times a week without getting water on your hands? Any hints? Get someone to bathe you, perhaps? Wear gloves tied with rubber bands?
also, his example of a woman who hadn’t bathed in three years? gross! I bet she was the same one in the next example who got dumped.
I think I agree with the gentleman unwilling to woo any lady who washes her face less than three times a week. Ick. Ick ick ick.
Actually, not washing the face (and rest of the body) daily, or even weekly, is one of the best beauty tips I know of. I take a shower once per week where I wash my scalp, and scalp only, with some kind of detergent (shampoo). I wash my face about once a month or less with some scrub.
Because of this, I don’t disturb the natural oil-balance in the skin. My face looks newly washed for weeks afterwards, and it’s always soft and without any blemishes or pimples. My hair is super-sleek and shiny, not oily. I don’t stink whatsoever, nor do I look unwashed.
Granted, it took a while for the body to adjust from daily washes to less than 4 per month, and that time was a horrible mess, due to the simple fact that the body was used to having its oils removed every day and was still overproducing it.
This wash less often, with less detergents, is THE best tip. You save time, looks better, and maybe even gets to feel better for a longer time in life due to the less amount of horrible chemicals our cosmetics and washing detergents contain (seriously, google all the ingredients in any ordinary shampoo and I bet you’ll find at least 3 that can cause some serious bad things).
Just my little 1880′s beauty tip. Goes for both men and women. I know my boyfriend is never going back to the daily washes again at least. :D
I am curious… how do you wash your scalp and not your hair??? I have shoulder-length hair and can’t figure out how I might wash my scalp without getting shampoo all over my hair as well…
By washing only the scalp, I mean applying the shampoo on the scalp only. The shampoo will then pass the hair when rinsing, of course. But it will cause much less “strippage” of the hair than applying shampoo in both scalp and hair. :)
The only important thing to watch for, as far as skin is concerned, is to always use luke-warm water to rinse – both too hot and too cold water damage the skin. And, of course, stay out of overly intense sunlight, that shit will age your skin like literally nothing else. Not smoking is recommended, as well.
Washing your face or showering too frequently not only disrupts the oil balance of the skin, it also strips it of its protective acid mantle that is produced by bacteria living on the skin. It takes about… seven hours, I think, to regenerate? So showering in the morning, just before you go out into the world where you NEED that acidic mantle, is very much an odd idea.
Of course, it all depends on the local climate, and the time of year.
As for the article… I honestly have trouble believing that it’s serious, even though surely it must be. Dancing in the sun, man. >D
Not to fear, all you physics-phobics. Ultraviolet light, the cause of less-than-lilly-white hands, does not penetrate glass well. So long as you are basking or dancing inside, you’re OK.