058r - - - - - [continued]
One needs to make at least three layers of flesh color to accomplish faces in oil. And at the beginning, one puts the black and umber where it is appropriate. Next, the heightening with lead white must not be put on the black. Flesh colors and with ceruse going in will yellow in five or six months, but lead white does not change.
Florence lake is better than the kind from Flanders for in Florence the best dyes are made. To make a beautiful flesh color, the reddest & liveliest lake is the best, for the kind that contains purpurine & violet, by admixture of too much alum, makes flesh color like that of one who is very cold. That is why ladies, wanting to color their cheeks, ground Florence lake very finely, then fill a little cotton with it, which they next wrap in a little fabric of Cambray which is clear. And thus they pounce the lake on their cheeks & then, with another clean cotton, they soften it.
Cristallin having been ground with water appears to be have body, but with oil it does not have any. It is ground with lake & with asphaltum, which would not dry for a very long time without this.
Spike lavender oil is commonly put with lead white, d not entirely pure but mixed with a little walnut oil. The said spike lavender oil would not be good for lake & colors that do not have body for it would make them crack, but with those that have body & are somewhat greasy, it is quite appropriate.
Verdigris and orpiment must first be ground with urine rather than thinning them with oil. Thus they are beautiful & do not die.