NEW WORK FOR WOMEN.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XII, Issue VI, 10 February 1894, Page 140

NEW WORK FOR WOMEN.

Still another lady has joined the army of workers in more or less original ways, that we are so familiar with of late. Nothing now surprises one as a field for lady workers ! Making bricks without straw was nothing to it, for, not content with performing this hitherto unheard-of feat, the modern lady workers, if they had been there, would not have rested until they bad succeeded in making the * strawless ’ bricks fashion’s latest fad, by means of cleverly devised * puffs,’ and so causing a run on them. But in this case it is not so much a question of a new and original employment as of the revival of an old one—a very old one even in the days of our grandmothers. This is the establishment of a genuine old-fashioned still-room for the purpose of distilling pure and wholesome perfumes and washes for the complexion from old-fashioned sweet smelling plants and flowers, ft is carried on by a lady who has mastered all the secrets of the fragrant, old fashioned * washes,’ in order to beautify and benefit her customers. She keeps a clever analytical chemist on the premises to pass and guarantee every lotion, powder, or cream prepared under her directions. She established the stillroom proper in order that the various ‘foundations,’ required by her in her toilet adjuncts might be perfectly pure and fresh, such as elderflower, and rose water, etc , and, in the pursuit of this part of her work, she is willing to give good prices for fresh dry rose leaves for distillation, elderflowers, thyme, Solomon’s seal, and heaps of other herbs and flowers, which I cannot now remember, but which might be found by studying up some old-fashioned herbals and works on botany. So here is a chance for you to cultivate a small corner in your delightful garden with these old-fashioned, out of date flowers, and perhaps come to some arrangement with some of the New Zealand perfume manufacturers for the sale of them. A walk through her charming ‘ still room,’ and the delightful fragrance and daintiness of some of her preparations, with their quaint old-world names all make one see in fancy the gardens of the past with their quaintly-cut stiff hedges, yew avenues, close clipped box borders, and the big. many coloured beds filled with sweet, homely old English flowers. And round and about the stately figures and the brocades and powdered hair of our great great grandmother !