CHAP. 47.—METHODS OF REMOVING SUPERFLUOUS HAIR. DEPILATORIES.

Depilatories are prepared from the blood, gall, and liver of the tunny, either fresh or preserved; as also from pounded liver of the same fish, preserved with cedar resin[1] in a leaden box; a re- cipe which we find given by the midwife Salpe[2] for disguising the age of boys on sale for slaves. A similar property belongs to the pulmo marinus,[3] to the blood and gall of the sea-hare, and to the sea-hare itself, stifled in oil. The same, too, with ashes of burnt crabs or sea scolopendræ,[4] mixed with oil; sea-nettles,[5] bruised in squill vinegar; and brains of the torpedo[6] applied with alum on the sixteenth day of the moon. The thick matter emitted by the small frogs, which we have described when treating[7] of eye-diseases, is a most efficient depilatory, if applied fresh: the same, too, with the frog itself, dried and pounded, and then boiled down to one-third in three heminæ of water, or else boiled in a copper vessel with oil in a like proportion. Others, again, prepare a depilatory from fifteen frogs, in manner already[8] stated under the head of remedies for the eyes. Leeches, also, grilled in an earthen vessel, and applied with vinegar, have the same property as a depilatory; the very odour, too, which attaches to the persons who thus burn them is singularly efficacious for killing bugs.[9] Cases are to be found, too, where persons have used castoreum with honey, for many days together, as a depilatory. In the case, however, of every depilatory, the hairs should always be removed before it is applied.

1. "Cedrium." See B. xvi. c. 21, and B. xxiv. c. 11.

2. See end of B. xxviii.

3. Or "sea-lungs." See Chapter 36 of this Book.

4. See B. ix. c. 67

5. See B. ix. c. 68.

6. See Note 90 above.

7. In Chapter 24 of this Book.

8. See the preceding Note.

9. See Chapter 42 of this Book.