<div>?The quest for physical beauty is essentially as old as Woman herself.” So decreed <I>A Complete Guide to Personal Loveliness</i> in 1937. Ah, but beauty can be a fickle and fleeting thing, so how have women?and, let’s not lie, some men?through the ages improved on what nature gave them?<BR> <BR> <I>The Finishing Touch</i> has the details. Carrying readers from Anglo-Saxon times (via a particularly gruesome prescription for cosmetic surgery) to the present, Julian Walker reveals the countless, occasionally desperate ways people have tried to make themselves more attractive. A facewash of boiled, minced pigeon, bear grease as a glistening pomade; a horseradish-and-milk cocktail to lighten a tan?these are just a few of the bizarre recipes and techniques that Walker has dug up (and that’s without even mentioning the tricks for keeping mice out of powdered wigs!).<BR> <BR> Not since Jonathan Swift showed us Celia’s dressing room, with its ?gallypots and vials placed / Some filled with washes, some with paste” have we had such a close-up look at the secrets of the dressing table. Decorated with images from the British Library’s vast collections, <I>The Finishing Touch</i> will charm, surprise, enlighten, and amuse men and women alike.</DIV>