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At the first audience when the Empress Dowager received the
foreign ladies, she presented each of them with two boxes of
combs, one ivory inlaid with gold, the other ordinary hard wood,
and the set was complete even to the fine comb. One cannot but
wonder if Her Majesty had not heard of the untidy locks of the
foreign woman, which she attributed to a lack of proper combs.
After the hair has been properly combed and ornamented, cosmetics
of white and carmine are brought for the face and neck. The
Manchu lady uses these in great profusion, her Chinese sister
more sparingly. No Chinese lady, unless a widow or a woman past
sixty, is supposed to appear in the presence of her family
without a full coating of powder and paint. A lady one day
complained to me of difficulty in lifting her eyelids, and
consulted me as to the reason.
"Perhaps," said I, "they are partially paralyzed by the lead in
your cosmetics. Wash off the paint and see if the nerves do not
recover their tone."
"But," said she, "I would not dare appear in the presence of my
husband or family without paint and powder; it would not be
respectable."
The final touch to the face is the deep carmine spot on the lower
lip.
The robing then begins. And what beautiful robes they are! the
softest silks, over which are worn in summer the most delicate of
embroidered grenadines, or in winter, rich satins lined with
costly furs, each season calling for a certain number and kind
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