Regency Health and Medicine: Freckles

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FRECKLES Are not exactly a disease but they are often felt as an inconvenience which like Lord Byron's cloud Has no business to appear When skies are blue and earth is gay We must therefore tax our philosophy to ex amine a little into the causes that we may discover if possible some means of preventing their un beautifying operation or of remedying their sear and yellow consequences It will be necessary however in order to follow us thoroughly for our fair readers to brush up their chemistry as we can not avoid talking about oxygen and heat and char coal and alkalis and the like Mrs Marcet's clever little work Conversations on Chemistry formerly mothered on Lady Davy is the best and easiest book to get a tea table knowledge of the science from and this is all that will be necessary for philosophising upon freckles To such as may be desirous of sporting a bit of medical Greek and Latin we may mention that freckles are called by the learned epichroses lenti cula but as we like to deal in facts and philosophy rather than in useless word knowing we shall throw these learned terms aside and let whoever chooses pick them up They might perhaps be useful to Ross Rowland or Prince to stick into their advertisements but we must keep to the un derstandables Learning in masquerade is always a mountebank ignorance with a Greek mask is either a ninny a natural or a swindler We shall first dispose of the less common sorts of freckles that we may have free space for the com mon ones Among the former we may reckon a hereditary disposition of the skin sometimes ob servable and particularly remarkable and unac countable in the dark complexioned children of parents who have bright auburn or red hair The freckles are often in this manner transmitted to the children when one only of the parents has this sort of hair This like all hereditary affections is much more difficult to remedy than mere summer cases of freckle though even in hereditary cases the receipts below will generally have some effect in improving the skin Freckles sometimes occur also in great abun dance during pregnancy and disappear after lying in They become particularly distinct in the latter months and evidently depend on the state of the blood and circulation of the skin We may say the same of the freckles of pregnancy as of the here ditary ones namely that a complete cure is im possible till after the confinement It is believed on the Continent that freckles in pregnancy foretel the birth of a female infant and Dr Riedlin a re spectable and scientific author gives his testimony to the truth of the opinion We are sorry that we have not yet observed a sufficient number of cases to say whether this holds good or not CAUSE OF FRECKLES You have observed a hundred times the effect which a strong heat produces on a bit of white paper changing it to every shade of yellow and brown in proportion to the violence of the heat to which it is exposed Think for a moment and you will perceive that it is precisely the same thing which often during summer dapples the leaves of trees and shrubs with rusty spots the heat of the sun acting on them as the heat of the fire did on the paper Chemistry explains these effects by saying that most combustible things of the vegetable and animal kingdoms have charcoal or as chemists call it carbon for their basis and the rest of their elements such as oxygen and other gases being rarefied and driven off by heat the charcoal alone is left behind in a greater or less degree of purity in proportion to the degree of heat which has been employed If all the oxygen and other gases have been driven off what is left behind will be pure charcoal and black If the oxygen and other gases have been only partially exhaled by the heat the residue will not be pure charcoal but will be brown yellow or orange of various shades There is another part of the process which we must explain chemically The oxygen when disengaged from the general substance of the paper or of the leaf by heat does not all nor always escape into the air for if it have a stronger friendship or affinity as the chemists say for any one of the remaining elements of the paper or of the leaf it will instantly combine with it and form a new compound For example if there be any iron in the paper or in the leaf the disengaged oxygen will eagerly join itself to it and form the brown substance called rust of iron and no ordinary degree of heat will afterwards be able to disjoin the oxygen and the iron Now iron being almost always present in all vegetables this gives you at once a clear explanation of the manner in which brown rusty spots are formed on leaves and fruit during the heats of summer If you apply this to the case of freckles on the skin you will find that it agrees in every particular The skin has charcoal for its basis in the same way as paper and vegetable leaves and if it be exposed to heat it will be more or less partially charred and coloured spots will consequently appear on the skin Besides it is now well known that there is a considerable quantity of iron in the blood and other constituents of the body the junction of this with oxygen will form rust of various shades according to its purity and its mixture with the disengaged charcoal This explains in a satisfactory manner the reason why those who have red hair are more liable to freckles than others for it is ascertained that the red colour of the hair arises from a red coloured oil containing a large proportion of iron As the skin and the hair therefore are so analogous in constitution the iron will of course superabound in both and be always ready on the least expo sure to heat to join the disengaged oxygen and form the rusty spots on the skin which we call freckles Having thus explained the philosophy of freckles as simply as we could and the first time we be lieve it has been done we must now try on the principles laid down the efficacy of certain things which have been proposed as REMEDIES FOR FRECKLES In the case of oxygen combining with the iron of the blood or skin and forming rusty spots the most effectual remedy will be that which shall dissolve this combination either by laying hold of the oxy gen or by seizing the iron and of these we have great variety But previous to the application of any of these it will be requisite to soften the skin itself in order to allow these remedies to penetrate more effectually for the freckles are not situated on the outer layer or scarf skin but on the second or middle membrane The softer therefore you can render the outer skin the more effectual will the direct remedies for freckles prove For this purpose you will do well to attend to what we shall recom mend in a subsequent page for the lips and parti cularly Lady Elizabeth Conyngham's lip honey which should be applied to the freckled parts of the skin for two or three days before you apply the chemical remedies Or you may use for the same purpose for two or three nights the ROMAN BALSAM FOR THE SKIN Take one ounce of bitter almonds one ounce of barley flour a sufficient quantity of honey Beat the whole into a smooth paste spread it thinly on the skin at night and wash it off in the morning The skin being thus prepared for the chemical remedies you may select any of the following or try them in succession if the freckles as they often do remain obstinate and refuse to yield to the most powerful means which can be devised for their re moval If you wish to decompose the freckles by trying something that will lay hold of the iron then we advise you to try the FRECKLE WASH Take one drachm of muriatic acid half a pint of rain water half a tea spoonful of spirit of lavender Mix and apply it two or three times a day to the freckles with a bit of linen or a camel hair pencil In this case the acid seizes upon the iron and the oxygen is set free On the other hand if you wish to attack the oxygen by preference you may try the PURIFYING WATER FOR THE SKIN Take one tea spoonful of liquor of potass two ounces and a half of pure water a few drops of eau de Cologne Mix and apply as before Again you may sometimes be able to remove freckles without decomposing them by merely sti mulating the absorbent vessels of the skin to take them up and carry them away as refuse and rub bish Any smart stimulant will act in this way but it has been found that the safest are those taken from the vegetable kingdom Among these one of the best and easiest made is DR WITHERING'S COSMETIC LOTION Take a tea cupful of soured milk cold scrape into it a quantity of horse radish Let this stand from six to twelve hours and strain when it may be used to wash the parts affected twice or thrice a day We could easily give you twenty other prescrip tions for freckles but if you find these fail you may begin to despair of a complete cure unless they depend as they sometimes do on the state of the blood or of the bile It may also be of advantage to attend to what we shall now say respecting sun burn The Art of Beauty; Or, the Best Methods of Improving and Preserving the Shape, Carriage, and Complexion. Together with the Theory of Beauty, 1825

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