MAY.

The Usher in charge of the cloak-room hands to the gentleman on arrival an envelope containing a diagram of the table (as cut shows), whereon the name and seat of the respective guest and the lady he is to escort to dinner are marked.

A card corresponding with his name is placed on the napkin belonging to the cover of the seat he will occupy.

The President's seat is in the middle of the table. The most distinguished guests sit on his right and left. If their wives are present they will occupy these seats, and the gentlemen will be seated next to the President's wife whose seat is directly opposite the President.

Official dinners all over the world are always served after the French fashion, and are divided into three distinct parts. Two of them are served from the kitchen, and the third from the pantry.

The first part of the dinner served French style includes from oysters on the shell to the sherbets.

The second service continues to the sweet dishes.

The third includes ice, cakes, fruits, cheeses, which are all understood as desserts, and are dressed in the pantry.

All principal dishes which are artistically decorated are shown to the President first, then are carried around the table before being carved by the Steward in the pantry.

Fancy folding of the napkins is considered out of fashion; plain square folded, so as to show monogram in the middle, is much preferred.

The following diagram will illustrate the arrangement of the glasses on the table. (See diagram.)

DIAGRAM ILLUSTRATING HOW TO ARRANGE GLASSES ON TABLE.

A—Plate.
I—Glass for Sauterne.
II—Glass for Sherry.
III—Glass for Rhine Wine.
IV—Glass for Water.
V—Glass for Champagne.
VI—Glass for Burgundy.

Flower decorations on the table are to be in flat designs, so as not to obscure the view of the guests.

Corsage boquets for ladies consist of not more than eight large roses tied together by silk ribbon, with the name of the lady stamped on in gold letters.

Gentlemen's bouttonieres consist only of one rosebud.

Boquets for ladies are to be placed on the right side; for gentlemen, on the napkin next to card bearing his name.

Printed menus are never used on any official occasion.

The private dinners menus are either printed or written on a plain card and placed on each cover.

Liquors, cordials, cigars are served on a separate table after the ladies have retired to the parlor.

FOR THE SICK.

Dishes for invalids should be served in the daintiest and most attractive way; never send more than a supply for one meal; the same dish too frequently set before an invalid often causes a distaste, when perhaps a change would tempt the appetite.

When preparing dishes where milk is used, the condition of the patient should be considered. Long cooking hardens the albumen and makes the milk very constipating; then, if the patient should be already constipated, care should be taken not to heat the milk above the boiling point.

The seasoning of food for the sick should be varied according to the condition of the patient; one recovering from illness can partake of a little piece of roast mutton, chicken, rabbit, game, fish, simply dressed, and simple puddings are all light food and easily digested. A mutton chop, nicely cut, trimmed and broiled, is a dish that is often inviting to an invalid. As a rule, an invalid will be more likely to enjoy any preparation sent to him if it is served in small delicate pieces. As there are so many small, dainty dishes that can be made for this purpose, it seems useless to try to give more than a small variety of them. Pudding can be made of prepared barley, or tapioca, well soaked before boiling, with an egg added, and a change can be made of light puddings by mixing up some stewed fruit with the puddings before baking; a bread pudding from stale bread crumbs, and a tiny cup-custard, boiled in a small basin or cup; also various drinks, such as milk punch, wine, whey, apple-toddy, and various other nourishing drinks.

BEEFSTEAK AND MUTTON CHOPS.

Select the tenderest cuts and broil over a clear, hot fire. Let the steak be rare, the chops well done. Salt and pepper, lay between two hot plates three minutes and serve to your patient. If he is very weak do not let him swallow anything except the juice, when he has chewed the meat well. The essence of rare beef, roasted or broiled, thus expressed, is considered by some physicians to be more strengthening than beef tea prepared in the usual manner.

BEEF TEA.

One pound of lean beef, cut into small pieces. Put into a glass canning jar, without a drop of water, cover tightly and set in a pot of cold water. Heat gradually to a boil and continue this steadily for three or four hours, until the meat is like white rags and the juice all drawn out. Season with salt to taste and, when cold, skim.

VEAL OR MUTTON BROTH.

Take a scrag-end of mutton (two pounds), put it in a saucepan with two quarts of cold water and an ounce of pearl barley or rice. When it is coming to a boil, skim it well, then add half a teaspoonful of salt; let it boil until half reduced, then strain it and take off all the fat and it is ready for use. This is excellent for an invalid. If vegetables are liked in this broth, take one turnip, one carrot and one onion, cut them in shreds and boil them in the broth half an hour. In that case, the barley may be served with the vegetables in broth.

CHICKEN BROTH.

Make the same as mutton or beef broth. Boil the chicken slowly, putting on just enough water to cover it well, watching it closely that it does not boil down too much. When the chicken is tender, season with salt and a very little pepper. The yolk of an egg beaten light and added, is very nourishing.

OATMEAL GRUEL.

Put four tablespoonfuls of the best grits (oatmeal coarsely ground) into a pint of boiling water. Let it boil gently, and stir it often, till it becomes as thick as you wish it. Then strain it, and add to it while warm, butter, wine, nutmeg, or whatever is thought proper to flavor it. Salt to taste.

If you make a gruel of fine oatmeal, sift it, mix it first to a thick batter with a little cold water, and then put it into the saucepan of boiling water. Stir it all the time it is boiling, lifting the spoon gently up and down, and letting the gruel fall slowly back again into the pan.

CORN MEAL GRUEL.

Two tablespoonfuls of fine Indian meal, mixed smooth with cold water, and a saltspoonful of salt; add one quart of boiling water and cook twenty minutes. Stir it frequently, and if it becomes too thick use boiling water to thin it. If the stomach is not too weak, a tablespoonful of cream may be used to cool it. Some like it sweetened and others like it plain. For very sick persons, let it settle, pour off the top, and give without other seasoning. For convalescents, toast a piece of bread as nicely as possible, and put it in the gruel with a tablespoonful of nice sweet cream and a little ginger and sugar. This should be used only when a laxative is allowed.

EGG GRUEL.

Beat the yolk of an egg with one tablespoonful of sugar; pour one teacupful of boiling water on it, add the white of an egg, beaten to a froth, with any seasoning or spice desired. Take warm.

MILK PORRIDGE.

The same as arrowroot, excepting it should be all milk, and thickened with a scant tablespoonful of sifted flour; let it boil five minutes, stirring it constantly, add a little cold milk, give it one boil up, and it is ready for use.

ARROWROOT MILK PORRIDGE.

One large cupful of fresh milk, new if you can get it, one cupful of boiling water, one teaspoonful of arrowroot, wet to a paste with sold water, two teaspoonfuls of white sugar, a pinch of salt. Put the sugar into the milk, the salt into the boiling water, which should be poured into a farina kettle. Add the wet arrowroot and boil, stirring constantly until it is clear; put in the milk and cook ten minutes, stirring often. Give while warm, adding hot milk should it be thicker than gruel.

ARROWROOT BLANC MANGE.

One large cupful of boiling milk, one even tablespoonful of arrowroot rubbed to a paste with cold water, two teaspoonfuls of white sugar, a pinch of salt, flavor with rose-water. Proceed as in the foregoing recipes, boiling and stirring eight minutes. Turn into a wet mold, and, when firm, serve with cream and powdered sugar.

TAPIOCA JELLY.

Soak a cupful of tapioca in a quart of cold water after washing it thoroughly two or three times; after soaking three or four hours, simmer it in a stewpan until it becomes quite clear, stirring often; add the juice of a lemon, and a little of the grated peel, also a pinch of salt. Sweeten to taste. Wine can be substituted for lemon, if liked.

SLIPPERY-ELM BARK TEA.

Break the bark into bits, pour boiling water over it, cover and let it infuse until cold. Sweeten, ice, and take for summer disorders, or add lemon juice and drink for a bad cold.

FLAX-SEED TEA.

Upon an ounce of unbruised flax-seed and a little pulverized liquorice-root pour a pint of boiling (soft or rain) water, and place the vessel containing these ingredients near, but not on, the fire for four hours. Strain through a linen cloth. Make it fresh every day. An excellent drink in fever accompanied by a cough.

FLAX-SEED LEMONADE.

To a large tablespoonful of flax-seed, allow a tumbler and a half of cold water. Boil them together till the liquid becomes very sticky. Then strain it hot over a quarter of a pound of pulverized sugar, and an ounce of pulverized gum arabic. Stir it till quite dissolved, and squeeze into it the juice of a lemon.

This mixture has frequently been found an efficacious remedy for a cold, taking a wine-glass of it as often as the cough is troublesome.

TAMARIND WATER.

Put tamarinds into a pitcher or tumbler till it is one-third full, then fill up with cold water, cover it, and let it infuse for a quarter of an hour or more.

Currant jelly or cranberry juice mixed with water makes a pleasant drink for an invalid.

SAGO JELLY.

Made the same as tapioca. If seasoning is not advisable the sago may be boiled in milk, instead of water, and eaten plain.

Rice jelly made the same, using only half as much rice as sago.

ARROWROOT WINE JELLY.

One cupful of boiling water, one scant tablespoonful of arrowroot, mixed with a little cold water, one tablespoonful of sugar, a pinch of salt, one tablespoonful of brandy, or three tablespoonfuls of wine. Excellent for a sick person without fever.

HOMINY.

Put to soak one pint of hominy in two and one-half pints of boiling water over night, in a tin vessel with a tight cover; in the morning add one-half pint of sweet milk and a little salt. Place on a brisk fire, in a kettle of boiling water, the tin vessel containing the hominy; let boil one-half hour.

Cracked wheat, oatmeal, mush, are all good food for the sick.

CHICKEN JELLY.

Cook a chicken in enough water to little more than cover it; let it stew gently until the meat drops from the bones, and the broth is reduced to about a pint; season it to taste, with a little salt and pepper. Strain and press, first through a colander, then through a coarse cloth. Set it over the fire again and cook a few minutes longer. Turn it into an earthen vegetable dish to harden; set it on the ice in the refrigerator. Eat cold in slices. Nice made into sandwiches, with thin slices of bread, lightly spread with butter.

BOILED RICE.

Boil half a cupful of rice in just enough water to cover it, with half a teaspoonful of salt; when the water has boiled nearly out and the rice begins to look soft and dry, turn over it a cupful of milk and let it simmer until the rice is done and nearly dry; take from the fire and beat in a well-beaten egg. Eat it warm with cream and sugar. Flavor to taste.

CUP PUDDING.

Take one tablespoonful of flour, one egg, mix with cold milk and a pinch of salt to a batter. Boil fifteen minutes in a buttered cup. Eat with sauce, fruit or plain sugar.

TAPIOCA CUP PUDDING.

This is very light and delicate for invalids. An even tablespoonful of tapioca, soaked for two hours in nearly a cup of new milk; stir into this the yolk of a fresh egg; a little sugar, a grain of salt, and bake it in a cup for fifteen minutes. A little jelly may be eaten with it.

BAKED APPLES.

Get nice fruit, a little tart and juicy, but not sour; clean them nicely, and bake in a moderate oven—regulated so as to have them done in about an hour; when the skin cracks and the pulp breaks through in every direction they are done and ready to take out. Serve with white sugar sprinkled over them.

SOFT TOAST.

Toast well, but not too brown, two thin slices of stale bread; put them on a warm plate, sprinkle with a pinch of salt, and pour upon them some boiling water; quickly cover with another dish of the same size, and drain off the water. Put a very small bit of butter on the toast and serve at once while hot.

IRISH MOSS BLANC MANGE.

A small handful of moss (to be purchased at any drug store), wash it very carefully, and put it in one quart of milk on the fire. Let the milk simmer for about twenty minutes, or until the moss begins to dissolve. Then remove from the fire and strain through a fine sieve. Add two tablespoonfuls of sugar and half a teaspoonful of vanilla flavoring. Put away to harden in cups or molds, and serve with sugar and cream.

A delicate dish for an invalid.

EGG TOAST.

Brown a slice of bread nicely over the coals, dip it in hot water slightly salted, butter it, and lay on the top an egg that has been broken into boiling water, and cooked until the white has hardened; season the egg with a bit of butter and a crumb of salt.

The best way to cook eggs for an invalid is to drop them, or else pour boiling water over the egg in the shell and let it stand for a few minutes on the back of the stove.

OYSTER TOAST.

Make a nice slice of dry toast, butter it and lay it on a hot dish. Put six oysters, half a teacupful of their own liquor, and half a cupful of milk, into a tin cup or basin, and boil one minute. Season with a little butter, pepper and salt, then pour over the toast and serve.

MULLED JELLY.

Take one tablespoonful of currant or grape jelly, beat with it the white of one egg and a teaspoonful of sugar; pour on it a teacupful of boiling water, and break in a slice of dry toast or two crackers.

CUP CUSTARD.

Break into a coffeecup an egg, put in two teaspoonfuls of sugar, beat it up thoroughly, a pinch of salt and a pinch of grated nutmeg; fill up the cup with good sweet milk, turn it into another cup, well buttered, and set it in a pan of boiling water, reaching nearly to the top of the cup. Set in the oven, and when the custard is set, it is done. Eat cold.

CLAM BROTH.

Select twelve small, hard-shell clams, drain them and chop them fine; add half a pint of clam juice or hot water, a pinch of cayenne, and a walnut of butter; simmer thirty minutes, add a gill of boiled milk, strain, and serve. This is an excellent broth for weak stomachs.

MILK OR CREAM CODFISH.

This dish will often relish when a person is recovering from sickness, when nothing else would. Pick up a large tablespoonful of salt codfish very fine, freshen it considerably by placing it over the fire in a basin, covering it with cold water as it comes to a boil; turn off the water and freshen again if very salt, then turn off the water until dry, and pour over half a cupful of milk or thin cream, add a bit of butter, a sprinkle of pepper, and a thickening made of one teaspoonful of flour or cornstarch, wet up with a little milk; when this boils up, turn over a slice of dipped toast.

CRACKER PANADA.

Break in pieces three or four hard crackers that are baked quite brown, and let them boil fifteen minutes in one quart of water; then remove from the fire, let them stand three or four minutes, strain off the liquor through a fine wire sieve, and season it with sugar.

This is a nourishing beverage for infants that are teething, and with the addition of a little wine and nutmeg, is often prescribed for invalids recovering from a fever.

BREAD PANADA.

Put three gills of water and one tablespoonful of white sugar on the fire, and just before it boils add two tablespoonfuls of the crumbs of stale white bread, stir it well, and let it boil three or four minutes, then add one glass of white wine, a grated lemon and a little nutmeg; let it boil up once, then remove it from the fire, and keep it closely covered until it is wanted for use.

SLIPPERY-ELM TEA.

Put a teaspoonful of powdered slippery-elm into a tumbler, pour cold water upon it, and season with lemon and sugar.

TOAST WATER, OR CRUST COFFEE.

Take stale pieces of crusts of bread, the end pieces of the loaf, toast them a nice, dark brown, care to be taken that they do not burn in the least, as that affects the flavor. Put the browned crusts into a large milk pitcher, and pour enough boiling water over to cover them; cover the pitcher closely, and let steep until cold. Strain, and sweeten to taste; put a piece of ice in each glass.

This is also good, drank warm with cream and sugar, similar to coffee.

PLAIN MILK TOAST.

Cut a thin slice from a loaf of stale bread, toast it very quickly, sprinkle a little salt over it, and pour upon it three tablespoonfuls of boiling milk or cream. Crackers split and toasted in this manner, are often very grateful to an invalid.

LINSEED TEA.

Put one tablespoonful of linseed into a stewpan with half a pint of cold water; place the stewpan over a moderate fire, and when the water is quite warm, pour it off, and add to the linseed half a pint of fresh cold water, then let the whole boil three or four minutes; season it with lemon and sugar.

POWDERS FOR CHILDREN.

A very excellent carminative powder for flatulent infants may be kept in the house, and employed with advantage whenever the child is in pain or griped, dropping five grains of oil of anise-seed and two of peppermint on half an ounce of lump sugar, and rubbing it in a mortar, with a drachm of magnesia, into a fine powder. A small quantity of this may be given in a little water at any time, and always with benefit.

FOR CHILDREN TEETHING.

Tie a quarter of a pound of wheat flour in a thick cloth and boil it in one quart of water for three hours; then remove the cloth and expose the flour to the air or heat until it is hard and dry; grate from it, when wanted, one tablespoonful, which put into half a pint of new milk, and stir over the fire until it comes to a boil, when add a pinch of salt and a tablespoonful of cold water and serve. This gruel is excellent for children afflicted with summer complaint.

Or brown a tablespoonful of flour in the oven or on top of the stove on a baking tin; feed a few pinches at a time to a child and it will often check a diarrhoea. The tincture of "kino"—of which from ten to thirty drops, mixed with a little sugar and water in a spoon, and given every two or three hours, is very efficacious and harmless—can be procured at almost any druggist's. Tablespoon doses of pure cider vinegar and a pinch of salt, has cured when all else failed.

BLACKBERRY CORDIAL.

This recipe may be found under the head of COFFEE, TEA, BEVERAGES. It will be found an excellent medicine for children teething, and summer diseases.

ACID DRINKS.

1. Peel thirty large Malaga grapes, and pour half a pint of boiling water upon them; cover them closely and let them steep until the water is cold.

2. Pour half a pint of boiling water upon one tablespoonful of currant jelly, and stir until the jelly is dissolved.

3. Cranberries and barberries may be used in the same way to make very refreshing acid drinks for persons recovering from fevers.

DRAUGHTS FOR THE FEET.

Take a large leaf from the horse-radish plant, and cut out the hard fibres that run through the leaf; place it on a hot shovel for a moment to soften it, fold it, and fasten it closely in the hollow of the foot by a cloth bandage.

Burdock leaves, cabbage leaves, and mullein leaves, are used in the same manner, to alleviate pain and promote perspiration.

Garlics are also made for draughts by pounding them, placing them on a hot tin plate for a moment to sweat them, and binding them closely to the hollow of the foot by a cloth bandage.

Draughts of onions, for infants, are made by roasting onions in hot ashes, and, when they are quite soft, peeling off the outside, mashing them, and applying them on a cloth as usual.

POULTICES.

A Bread and Milk Poultice.—Put a tablespoonful of the crumbs of stale bread into a gill of milk, and give the whole one boil up. Or, take stale bread crumbs, pour over them boiling water and boil till soft, stirring well; take from the fire and gradually stir in a little glycerine or sweet oil, so as to render the poultice pliable when applied.

A Hop Poultice.—Boil one handful of dried hops in half a pint of water, until the half pint is reduced to a gill, then stir into it enough Indian meal to thicken it.

A Mustard Poultice.—Into one gill of boiling water stir one tablespoonful of Indian meal; spread the paste thus made upon a cloth and spread over the paste one teaspoonful of mustard flour. If you wish a mild poultice, use a teaspoonful of mustard as it is prepared for the table, instead of the mustard flour.

Equal parts of ground mustard and flour made into a paste with warm water, and spread between two pieces of muslin, form the indispensable mustard plaster.

A Ginger Poultice.—This is made like a mustard poultice, using ground ginger instead of mustard. A little vinegar is sometimes added to each of these poultices.

A Stramonium Poultice.—Stir one tablespoonful of Indian meal into a gill of boiling water and add one tablespoonful of bruised stramonium seeds.

Wormwood and Arnica are sometimes applied in poultices. Steep the herbs in half a pint of cold water and when all their virtue is extracted stir in a little bran or rye meal to thicken the liquid; the herbs must not be removed from the liquid.

This is a useful application for sprains and bruises.

Linseed Poultice.—Take four ounces of powdered linseed and gradually sprinkle it into a half pint of hot water.

A REMEDY FOR BOILS.

An excellent remedy for boils is water of a temperature agreeable to the feelings of the patient. Apply wet linen to the part affected and frequently renew or moisten it. It is said to be the most effectual remedy known. Take inwardly some good blood purifier.

CURE FOR RINGWORMS.

Yellow dock, root or leaves, steeped in vinegar, will cure the worst case of ringworm.

HEALTH-SUGGESTIONS.

HOW COLDS ARE CAUGHT.

A great many cannot see why it is they do not take a cold when exposed to cold winds and rain. The fact is, and ought to be more generally understood, that nearly every cold is contracted indoors, and is not directly due to the cold outside, but to the heat inside. A man will go to bed at night feeling as well as usual and get up in the morning with a royal cold. He goes peeking around in search of cracks and keyholes and tiny drafts. Weather-strips are procured, and the house made as tight as a fruit can. In a few days more the whole family have colds.

Let a man go home, tired or exhausted, eat a full supper of starchy and vegetable food, occupy his mind intently for a while, go to bed in a warm, close room, and if he doesn't have a cold in the morning it will be a wonder. A drink of whisky or a glass or two of beer before supper will facilitate matters very much.

People swallow more colds down their throats than they inhale or receive from contact with the air, no matter how cold or chilly it may be. Plain, light suppers are good to go to bed on, and are far more conducive to refreshing sleep than a glass of beer or a dose of chloral. In the estimation of a great many this statement is rank heresy, but in the light of science, common sense and experience it is gospel truth.

Pure air is strictly essential to maintain perfect health. If a person is accustomed to sleeping with the windows open there is but little danger of taking cold winter or summer. Persons that shut up the windows to keep out the "night air" make a mistake, for at night the only air we breathe is "night air," and we need good air while asleep as much or even more than at any other time of day. Ventilation can be accomplished by simply opening the window an inch at the bottom and also at the top, thus letting the pure air in, the bad air going outward at the top. Close, foul air poisons the blood, brings on disease which often results in death; this poisoning of the blood is only prevented by pure air, which enters the lungs, becomes charged with waste particles, then thrown out, and which are poisoning if taken back again. It is estimated that a grown person corrupts one gallon of pure air every minute, or twenty-five barrels full in a single night, in breathing alone.

Clothes that have been worn through the day should be changed for fresh or dry ones to sleep in. Three pints of moisture, filled with the waste of the body, are given off every twenty-four hours, and this is mostly absorbed by the clothing. Sunlight and exposure to the air purifies the clothing of the poisons which nature is trying to dispose of, and which would otherwise be brought again into contact with the body.

Colds are often taken by extreme cold and heat, and a sudden exposure to cold by passing from a heated room to the cold outside air. Old and weak persons, especially, should avoid such extreme change. In passing from warm crowded rooms to the cold air, the mouth should be kept closed, and all the breathing done through the nostrils only, that the cold air may be warmed before it reaches the lungs, or else the sudden change will drive the blood from the surface of the internal organs, often producing congestions.

Dr. B. I. Kendall writes that "the temperature of the body should be evenly and properly maintained to secure perfect health; and to accomplish this purpose requires great care and caution at times. The human body is, so to speak, the most delicate and intricate piece of machinery that could possibly be conceived of, and to keep this in perfect order requires constant care. It is a fixed law of nature that every violation thereof shall be punished; and so we find that he who neglects to care for his body by protecting it from sudden changes of weather, or draughts of cold air upon unprotected parts of the body, suffers the penalty by sickness, which may vary according to the exposure and the habits of the person, which affect the result materially; for what would be an easy day's work for a man who is accustomed to hard labor, would be sufficient to excite the circulation to such an extent in a person unaccustomed to work, that only slight exposure might cause the death of the latter when over-heated in this way; while the same exercise and exposure to the man accustomed to hard labor might not affect him. So, we say, be careful of your bodies, for it is a duty you owe to yourselves, your friends, and particularly to Him who created you. When your body is over-heated and you are perspiring, be very careful about sitting down to 'cool off,' as the custom of some is, by removing a part of the clothing and sitting in a cool place, and perhaps where there is a draught of air passing over your body. The proper way to 'cool off' when over-heated is to put on more clothing, especially if you are in a cool place; but never remove a part of the clothing you have already on. If possible get near a fire where there is no wind blowing, and dry off gradually, instead of cooling off suddenly, which is always dangerous."

Many colds are taken from the feet being damp or wet. To keep these extremities warm and dry is a great preventative against the almost endless list of disorders which come from a "slight cold." Many imagine if their feet are not thoroughly wet, there will be no harm arising from mere dampness, not knowing that the least dampness is absorbed into the sole, and is attracted nearer the foot itself by its heat, and thus perspiration is dangerously checked.

WATER.

All beings need drink as much as they need food, and it is just as necessary to health as pure air; therefore the water should be boiled or filtered before being drank. Rain-water filtered is probably the best attainable. Boiling the water destroys the vegetable and animal matter, and leaves the mineral matter deposited on the bottom of the vessel containing it; therefore it leaves it clear from poisonous substances.

REGULATION IN DIET.

The food we eat is a very important item, and one which it would be difficult to arrange any rule for which would apply to all persons under different circumstances. In health, it is safer to eat by instinct rather than to follow any definite rules. While there are many who have a scanty living, with a small variety of food, there is a large number who have an abundance and a large variety. The former class, in many cases, live miserable lives, either to hoard up for miserly purposes the money which might make them happy, or in some cases through poverty; while the latter class, as a rule, have better health and have much more enjoyment in this life, unless it be some who are gluttonous, and make themselves miserable by abusing the blessings they should enjoy. Avoid extremes in living too free or scanty; have a good nourishing diet and a sufficient quantity, and it should always be properly cooked; for if the cooking is poorly done, it affects not only the nutritious qualities, but is not so easily digested, thus making food, which is originally the best kind, of very little value to us, and with very poor cooking it is sometimes a positive injury.

It is very important that the food be taken with regularity at the accustomed time. Be careful not to take too much drink during any meal, but, if thirsty, drink water before meal time so that you will not care for it until some time after eating, as it is a bad plan to drink much either during or for a little time after the meal is taken. It is a very bad plan to hurry in eating, because by so doing the food is not properly masticated; it is better to be a long time in eating and chew the food well.

Dr. B. I. Kendall, Enosburg Falls, Vt.

HOW TO USE HOT WATER.

One of the simplest and most effectual means of relieving pain is by the use of hot water, externally and internally, the temperature varying according to the feelings of the patient. For bruises, sprains, and similar accidental hurts, it should be applied immediately, as hot as can be borne, by means of a cloth dipped in the water and laid on the wounded part, or by immersion, if convenient, and the treatment kept up until relief is obtained. If applied at once, the use of hot water will generally prevent, nearly, if not entirely, the bruised flesh from turning black. For pains resulting from indigestion, and known as wind colic, etc., a cupful of hot water, taken in sips, will often relieve at once. When that is insufficient, a flannel folded in several thicknesses, large enough to fully cover the painful place should be wrung out of hot water and laid over the seat of the pain. It should be as hot as the skin can bear without injury, and be renewed every ten minutes or oftener, if it feels cool, until the pain is gone. The remedy is simple, efficient, harmless, and within the reach of every one; and should be more generally used than it is. If used along with common sense, it might save many a doctor's bill, and many a course of drug treatment as well.

GROWING PAINS CURED.

Following in our mother's footsteps, we have been routed night after night from our warm quarters, in the dead of winter, to kindle fires and fill frosty kettles from water-pails thickly crusted with ice, that we might get the writhing pedal extremities of our little heir into a tub of water as quickly as possible. But lately we have learned that all this work and exposure is needless. We simply wring a towel from salted water—a bowl of it standing in our sleeping room, ready for such an emergency—wrap the limb in it from the ankle to knee, without taking the child from his bed, and then swathe with dry flannels, thick and warm, tucking the blankets about him a little closer, and relief is sure.

Good Housekeeping.

HOW TO KEEP WELL.

Don't sleep in a draught.

Don't go to bed with cold feet.

Don't stand over hot-air registers.

Don't eat what you do not need, just to save it.

Don't try to get cool too quickly after exercising.

Don't sleep in a room without ventilation of some kind.

Don't stuff a cold lest you should be next obliged to starve a fever.

Don't sit in a damp or chilly room without a fire.

Don't try to get along without flannel underclothing in winter.

DIPHTHERIA.

A gargle of sulphur and water has been used with much success in cases of diphtheria. Let the patient swallow a little of the mixture. Or, when you discover that your throat is a little sore, bind a strip of flannel around the throat, wet in camphor, and gargle salt and vinegar occasionally.

COLDS AND HOARSENESS.

Borax has proved a most effective remedy in certain forms of colds. In sudden hoarseness or loss of voice in public speakers or singers, from colds, relief for an hour or so may be obtained by slowly dissolving, and partially swallowing, a lump of borax the size of a garden pea, or about three or four grains held in the mouth for ten or fifteen minutes before speaking or singing. This produces a profuse secretion of saliva or "watering" of the mouth and throat, just as wetting brings back the missing notes to a flute when it is too dry.

A flannel dipped in boiling water and sprinkled with turpentine, laid on chest as quickly as possible, will relieve the most severe cold or hoarseness.

Another simple, pleasant remedy is furnished by beating up the white of one egg, adding to it the juice of one lemon, and sweetening with white sugar to taste. Take a teaspoonful from time to time. It has been known to effectually cure the ailment.

Or bake a lemon or sour orange twenty minutes in a moderate oven. When done, open at one end and take out the inside. Sweeten with sugar or molasses. This is an excellent remedy for hoarseness.

An old time and good way to relieve a cold is to go to bed and stay there, drinking nothing, not even water, for twenty-four hours, and eating as little as possible. Or go to bed, put your feet in hot mustard and water, put a bran or oatmeal poultice on the chest, take ten grains of Dover's powder, and an hour afterwards a pint of hot gruel; in the morning, rub the body all over with a coarse towel, and take a dose of aperient medicine.

Violet, pennyroyal or boneset tea, is excellent to promote perspiration in case of sudden chill. Care should be taken next day not to get chilled by exposure to fresh out-door air.

MOLASSES POSSET.

This old-fashioned remedy for a cold is as effectual now as it was in old times. Put into a saucepan a pint of the best West India molasses, a teaspoonful of powdered white ginger and a quarter of a pound of fresh butter. Set it over the fire and simmer it slowly for half an hour, stirring it frequently. Do not let it come to a boil. Then stir in the juice of two lemons, or two tablespoonfuls of vinegar; cover the pan and let it stand by the fire five minutes longer. This is good for a cold. Some of it may be taken warm at once, and the remainder kept at hand for occasional use.

It is the preparation absurdly called by the common people stewed quaker.

Half a pint of strained honey mixed cold with the juice of a lemon and a tablespoonful of sweet oil, is another remedy for a cold; a teaspoonful or two to be taken whenever the cough is troublesome.

COUGH SYRUP.

Syrup of squills four ounces, syrup of tolu four ounces, tincture of bloodroot one and one-half ounces, camphorated tincture of opium four ounces. Mix. Dose for an adult, one teaspoonful repeated every two to four hours, or as often as necessary.

LEANNESS.

Is caused generally by lack of power in the digestive organs to digest and assimilate the fat-producing elements of food. First restore digestion, take plenty of sleep, drink all the water the stomach will bear in the morning on rising, take moderate exercise in the open air, eat oatmeal, cracked wheat, graham mush, baked sweet apples, roasted and broiled beef, cultivate jolly people, and bathe daily.

FOR TOOTHACHE.

The worst toothache, or neuralgia, coming from the teeth may be speedily and delightfully ended by the application of a bit of clean cotton saturated in a solution of ammonia to the defective tooth. Sometimes the late sufferer is prompted to momentary laughter by the application, but the pain will disappear.

Alum reduced to a powder, a teaspoonful of the powder and an equal quantity of fine salt well mixed, applied to the gums by dipping your moistened finger in the mixed powder; put some also in the tooth, and keep rubbing the gums with it; it scarcely ever fails to cure.

TO CURE A STING OF A BEE OR WASP.

Bind on common baking soda, dampened with water. Or mix common earth with water to about the consistency of mud.

TO CURE EARACHE.

Take a bit of cotton batting, put on it a pinch of black pepper, gather it up and tie it, dip it in sweet oil, and insert it in the ear; put a flannel bandage over the head to keep it warm; it often gives immediate relief.

Tobacco smoke, puffed into the ear, has often been effectual.

Another remedy: Take equal parts of tincture of opium and glycerine. Mix, and from a warm teaspoon drop two or three drops into the ear, stop the ear tight with cotton, and repeat every hour or two. If matter should form in the ear, make a suds with castile soap and warm water, about 100° F., or a little more than milk warm, and have some person inject it into the ear while you hold that side of your head the lowest. If it does not heal in due time, inject a little carbolic acid and water in the proportion of one drachm of the acid to one pint of warm water each time after using the suds.

CROUP.

Croup, it is said, can be cured in one minute, and the remedy is simply alum and sugar. Take a knife or grater and shave off in small particles about a teaspoonful of alum; then mix it with twice its amount of sugar, to make it palatable, and administer it as quickly as possible. Almost instantaneous relief will follow. Turpentine is said to be an excellent remedy for croup. Saturate a piece of flannel and apply it to the chest and throat, and take inwardly three or four drops on a lump of sugar.

Another remedy.—Give a teaspoonful of ipecacuanha wine every few minutes, until free vomiting is excited.

Another recipe said to be most reliable: Take two ounces of the wine of ipecac, hive syrup four ounces, tincture of bloodroot two ounces. Mix it well.

Dose for a child one year old, five to ten drops; two years, eight to twelve drops; three years, twelve to fifteen drops; four years, fifteen to twenty drops; five years, twenty to twenty-five drops, and older children in proportion to age. Repeat as often as shall be necessary to procure relief. If it is thought best to produce vomiting, repeat the dose every ten or fifteen minutes for a few doses.

BURNS AND SCALDS.

A piece of cotton wadding, spread with butter or sweet oil, and bound on the burn instantly, will draw out the pain without leaving a scar; also a handful of flour, bound on instantly, will prevent blistering. The object is to entirely exclude the air from the part affected. Some use common baking-soda, dry or wet, often giving instant relief, withdrawing the heat and pain. Another valuable remedy is to beat the yellow of an egg into linseed oil, and apply it with a feather on the injured part frequently. It will afford ready relief and heals with great rapidity. Some recommend the white part of the egg, which is very cooling and soothing, and soon allays the smarting pain. It is the exposure of the part coming in contact with the air that gives the extreme discomfort experienced from ordinary afflictions of this kind, and anything which excludes air and prevents inflammation is the thing to be at once applied.

TO STOP THE FLOW OF BLOOD.

For a slight cut there is nothing better to control the hemorrhage than common unglazed brown wrapping paper, such as is used by marketmen and grocers; a piece to be bound over the wound. A handful of flour bound on the cut. Cobwebs and brown sugar, pressed on like lint. When the blood ceases to flow, apply arnica or laudanum.

When an artery is cut the red blood spurts out at each pulsation. Press the thumb firmly over the artery near the wound, and on the side toward the heart. Press hard enough to stop the bleeding, and wait till a physician comes. The wounded person is often able to do this himself, if he has the requisite knowledge.

GRAVEL.

Into a pint of water put two ounces of bicarbonate of soda. Take two tablespoonfuls in the early forenoon, and the same toward night; also drink freely of water through the day. Inflammation of the kidneys has been successfully treated with large doses of lime-water.

Persons troubled with kidney difficulty should abstain from sugar and the things that are converted into sugar in digestion, such as starchy food and sweet vegetables.

SORE THROAT.

Everybody has a cure for this trouble, but simple remedies appear to be most effectual. Salt and water is used by many as a gargle, but a little alum and honey dissolved in sage tea is better. An application of cloths wrung out of hot water and applied to the neck, changing as often as they begin to cool, has the most potency for removing inflammation of anything we ever tried. It should be kept up for a number of hours; during the evening is usually the most convenient time for applying this remedy.

Cut slices of salt pork or fat bacon, simmer a few minutes in hot vinegar, and apply to throat as hot as possible. When this is taken off as the throat is relieved, put around a bandage of soft flannel. A gargle of equal parts of borax and alum, dissolved in water, is also excellent. To be used frequently.

Camphorated oil is an excellent lotion for sore throat, sore chest, aching limbs, etc. For a gargle for sore throat, put a pinch of chlorate of potash in a glass of water. Gargle the throat with it twice a day, or oftener, if necessary.

WHOOPING COUGH.

Two level tablespoonfuls of powdered alum, two-thirds of a cupful of brown sugar, dissolved in two quarts of water; bottle and put in a dark closet where it is cool.

For a child one year old, a teaspoonful three times a day on an empty stomach. For a child two years old, two teaspoonfuls for a dose. For a child five years old, a tablespoonful. The state of the bowels must be attended to, and the doses repeated accordingly. No other medicine to be taken, except an emetic, at first, if desirable. Except in the case of an infant, a milk diet is to be avoided.

DIARRHOEA.

Take tincture of Jamaica ginger one ounce, tincture of rhubarb one ounce, tincture of opium half ounce, tincture of cardamom one and one-half ounces, tincture of kino one ounce. Mix. Dose for an adult, half to one teaspoonful, repeated every two to four hours; and for children one year old, five drops; two years old, five to ten drops; three years old, ten to twelve drops, and older children in proportion to age.

FOR CONSTIPATION.

One or two figs eaten fasting is sufficient for some, and they are especially good in the case of children, as there is no trouble in getting them to take them. A spoonful of wheaten bran in a glass of water is a simple remedy, and quite effective, taken half an hour before breakfast; fruit eaten raw; partake largely of laxative food; exercise in the open air; drink freely of cold water during the day, etc. It is impossible to give many of the numerous treatments in so short a space, suffice it to say that the general character of our diet and experience is such as to assure us that at least one-quarter of the food that we swallow is intended by nature to be evacuated from the system; and if it is not, it is again absorbed into the system, poisoning the blood and producing much suffering and permanent disease. The evacuation of the bowels daily, and above all, regularity, is therefore all important to aid this form of disorder.

RELIEF FROM ASTHMA.

Sufferers from asthma should get a muskrat skin and wear it over their lungs with the fur side next to the body. It will bring certain relief.

Or soak blotting paper in saltpetre water, then dry, burning at night in the patient's bedroom.

Another excellent recipe: Take powdered liquorice root, powdered elecampane root, powdered anise-seed, each one drachm, powdered ipecac ten grains, powdered lobelia ten grains; add sufficient amount of tar to form into pills of ordinary size. Take three or four pills on going to bed. An excellent remedy for asthma or shortness of breath.

RECIPES FOR FELONS.

Take common rock salt, as used for salting down pork or beef, dry in an oven, then pound it fine and mix with spirits of turpentine in equal parts; put it in a rag and wrap it around the parts affected; as it gets dry put on more, and in twenty-four hours you are cured. The felon will be dead.

Or purchase the herb of stramonium at the druggist's; steep it and bind it on the felon; as soon as cold, put on new, warm herbs. It will soon kill it, in a few hours at least.

Or saturate a bit or grated wild turnip, the size of a bean, with spirits of turpentine, and apply it to the affected part. It relieves the pain at once; in twelve hours there will be a hole to the bone, and the felon destroyed; then apply healing salve, and the finger is well.

Another Way to Cure a Felon: Fill a tumbler with equal parts of fine salt and ice; mix well. Sink the finger in the centre, allow it to remain until it is nearly frozen and numb; then withdraw it, and when sensation is restored, renew the operation four or five times, when it will be found the disease is destroyed. This must be done before pus is formed.

A simple remedy for felons, relieving pain at once, no poulticing, no cutting, no "holes to the bone," no necessity for healing salve, but simple oil of cedar applied a few times at the commencement of the felon, and the work is done.

REMEDY FOR LOCKJAW.

If any person is threatened or taken with lockjaw from injuries of the arms, legs or feet, do not wait for a doctor, but put the part injured in the following preparation: Put hot wood-ashes into water as warm as can be borne; if the injured part cannot be put into water, then wet thick folded cloths in the water and apply them to the part as soon as possible, at the same time bathe the backbone from the neck down with some laxative stimulant—say cayenne pepper and water, or mustard and water (good vinegar is better than water); it should be as hot as the patient can bare it. Don't hesitate; go to work and do it, and don't stop until the jaws will come open. No person need die of lockjaw if these directions are followed.

Cure for Lockjaw, Said to be Positive.—Let anyone who has an attack of lockjaw take a small quantity of spirits of turpentine, warm it, and pour it in the wound—no matter where the wound is or what its nature is—and relief will follow in less than one minute. Turpentine is also a sovereign remedy for croup. Saturate a piece of flannel with it, and place the flannel on the throat and chest—- and in very severe cases, three to five drops on a lump of sugar may be taken internally.

BLEEDING AT THE NOSE.

Roll up a piece of paper and press it under the upper lip. In obstinate cases, blow a little gum arabic up the nostril through a quill, which will immediately stop the discharge; powdered alum, dissolved in water, is also good. Pressure by the finger over the small artery near the ala (wing) of the nose on the side where the blood is flowing, is said to arrest the hemorrhage immediately. Sometimes by wringing a cloth out of very hot water and laying it on the back of the neck, gives relief. Napkins wrung out of cold water must be laid across the forehead and nose, the hands dipped in cold water, and a bottle of hot water applied to the feet.

TO TAKE CINDERS FROM THE EYE.

In most cases a simple and effective cure may be found in one or two grains of flax-seed, which can be placed in the eye without pain or injury. As they dissolve, a glutinous substance is formed, which envelops any foreign body that may be under the lid, and the whole is easily washed out. A dozen of these seeds should constitute a part of every traveler's outfit.

Another remedy for removing objects from the eye: Take a horse-hair and double it, leaving a loop. If the object can be seen, lay the loop over it, close the eye, and the mote will come out as the hair is withdrawn. If the irritating object cannot be seen, raise the lid of the eye as high as possible and place the loop as far as you can, close the eye and roll the ball around a few times, draw out the hair, and the substance which caused the pain will be sure to come with it. This method is practiced by axemakers and other workers in steel.

Montreal Star.

EYE-WASHES.

The best eye-wash for granulated lids and inflammation of the eyes is composed of camphor, borax and morphine, in the following proportions: To a large wine-glass of camphor water—not spirits—add two grains of morphine and six grains of borax. Pour a few drops into the palm of the hand, and hold the eye in it, opening the lid as much as possible. Do this three or four times in twenty-four hours, and you will receive great relief from pain and smarting soreness. This recipe was received from a celebrated oculist, and has never failed to relieve the most inflamed eyes.

Another remedy said to be reliable: A lump of alum as large as a cranberry boiled in a teacupful of sweet milk, and the curd used as a poultice, is excellent for inflammation of the eyes.

Another wash: A cent's worth of pure, refined white copperas dissolved in a pint of water, is also a good lotion; but label it poison, as it should never go near the mouth. Bathe the eyes with the mixture, either with the hands or a small piece of linen cloth, allowing some of the liquid to get under the lids.

Here is another from an eminent oculist: Take half an ounce of rock salt and one ounce of dry sulphate of zinc; simmer in a clean, covered porcelain vessel with three pints of water until all are dissolved; strain through thick muslin; add one ounce of rose-water; bottle and cork it tight. To use it, mix one teaspoonful of rain-water with one of the eye-water, and bathe the eyes frequently. If it smarts too much, add more water.

SUNSTROKE.

Wrap a wet cloth bandage over the head; wet another cloth, folded small, square, cover it thickly with salt, and bind it on the back of the neck; apply dry salt behind the ears. Put mustard plasters to the calves of the legs and soles of the feet. This is an effectual remedy.

TO REMOVE WARTS.

Wash with water saturated with common washing-soda, and let it dry without wiping; repeat frequently until they disappear. Or pass a pin through the wart and hold one end of it over the flame of a candle or lamp until the wart fires by the heat, and it will disappear.

Another treatment of warts is to pare the hard and dry skin from their tops, and then touch them with the smallest drop of strong acetic acid, taking care that the acid does not run off the wart upon the neighboring skin; for if it does it will occasion inflammation and much pain. If this is continued once or twice daily, with regularity, paring the surface of the wart occasionally when it gets hard and dry, the wart will soon be effectually cured.

SWAIM'S VERMIFUGE.

Worm seed, two ounces; valerian, rhubarb, pink root, white agaric, senna, of each one ounce and a half. Boil in sufficient water to yield three quarts of decoction. Now add to it ten drops of the oil of tansy and forty-five drops of the oil of cloves, dissolved in a quart of rectified spirit. Dose: one tablespoonful at night.

FAINTING. (Syncope.)

Immediately place the person fainting in a lying position, with head lower than body. In this way consciousness returns immediately, while in the erect position it often ends in death.

FOR SEVERE SPRAINS.

The white of an egg, a tablespoonful of vinegar and a tablespoonful of spirits of turpentine. Mix in a bottle, shake thoroughly, and bathe the sprain as soon as possible after the accident. This was published in Life Secrets, but it is republished by request on account of its great value. It should be remembered by everyone.

An invaluable remedy for a sprain or bruise is wormwood boiled in vinegar and applied hot, with enough cloths wrapped around it to keep the sprain moist.

CAMPHORATED OIL.

Best oil of Lucca, gum camphor. Pound some gum camphor and fill a wide-necked pint bottle one-third full; fill up with olive oil and set away until the camphor is absorbed. Excellent lotion for sore chest, sore throat, aching limbs, etc.

LINIMENT FOR CHILBLAINS.

Spirits of turpentine, three drachms; camphorated oil, nine drachms.

Mix for a liniment. For an adult four drachms of the former and eight of the latter may be used. If the child be young, or if the skin be tender, the camphorated oil may be used without the turpentine.

"THE SUN'S" CHOLERA MIXTURE.

More than forty years ago, when it was found that prevention for the Asiatic cholera was easier than cure, the learned doctors of both hemispheres drew up a prescription, which was published (for working people) in The New York Sun, and took the name of "The Sun Cholera Mixture." It is found to be the best remedy for looseness of the bowels ever yet devised. It is to be commended for several reasons. It is not to be mixed with liquor, and therefore will not be used as an alcoholic beverage. Its ingredients are well known among all the common people, and it will have no prejudice to combat; each of the materials is in equal proportions to the others, and it may therefore be compounded without professional skill; and as the dose is so very small, it may be carried in a tiny phial in the waistcoat pocket, and be always at hand. It is:—

Take equal parts of tincture of cayenne, tincture of opium, tincture of rhubarb, essence of peppermint and spirits of camphor. Mix well. Dose fifteen to thirty drops in a wine-glass of water, according to age and violence of the attack. Repeat every fifteen or twenty minutes until relief is obtained. No one who takes it in time will ever have the cholera. Even when no cholera is anticipated, it is a valuable remedy for ordinary summer complaints, and should always be kept in readiness.

COMP. CATHARTIC ELIXIR.

The only pleasant and reliable cathartic in liquid form that can be prescribed.

Each fluid ounce contains: sulp. magnesia one drachm, senna two drachms, scammony six grains, liquorice one drachm, ginger three grains, coriander, five grains, with flavoring ingredients.

Dose.—Child five years old, one or two teaspoonfuls; adult, one or two tablespoonfuls.

This preparation is being used extensively throughout the country. It was originated with the design of furnishing a liquid cathartic remedy that could be prescribed in a palatable form. It will be taken by children with a relish.

GRANDMOTHER'S COUGH SYRUP.

Take half a pound of dry hoarhound herbs, one pod of red pepper, four tablespoonfuls of ginger, boil all in three quarts of water, then strain, and add one teaspoonful of good, fresh tar and a pound of sugar. Boil slowly and stir often, until it is reduced to one quart of syrup. When cool, bottle for use. Take one or two teaspoonfuls four or six times a day.

GRANDMOTHER'S UNIVERSAL LINIMENT.

One pint of alcohol and as much camphor gum as can be dissolved in it, half an ounce of the oil of cedar, one-half ounce of the oil of sassafras, aqua ammonia half an ounce, and the same amount of the tincture of morphine. Shake well together and apply by the fire; the liniment must not be heated, or come in contact with the fire, but the rubbing to be done by the warmth of the fire.

These recipes of Grandmother's are all old, tried medicines, and are more effectual than most of those that are advertised, as they have been thoroughly tried, and proved reliable.

GRANDMOTHER'S FAMILY SPRING BITTERS.

Mandrake root one ounce, dandelion root one ounce, burdock root one ounce, yellow dock root one ounce, prickly ash berries two ounces, marsh mallow one ounce, turkey rhubarb half an ounce, gentian one ounce, English camomile flowers one ounce, red clover tops two ounces.

Wash the herbs and roots; put them into an earthen vessel, pour over two quarts of water that has been boiled and cooled; let it stand over night and soak; in the morning set it on the back of the stove, and steep it five hours; it must not boil, but be nearly ready to boil. Strain it through a cloth, and add half a pint of good gin. Keep it in a cool place. Half a wine-glass taken as a dose twice a day.

This is better than all the patent blood medicines that are in the market—a superior blood purifier, and will cure almost any malignant sore, by taking according to direction, and washing the sore with a strong tea of red raspberry leaves steeped, first washing the sore with castile soap, then drying with a soft cloth, and washing it with the strong tea of red raspberry leaves.

GRANDMOTHER'S EYE-WASH.

Take three fresh eggs and break them into one quart of clear, cold rain-water; stir until thoroughly mixed; bring to a boil on a slow fire, stirring often; then add half an ounce of sulphate of zinc (white vitrol); continue the boiling for two minutes, then set it off the fire. Take the curd that settles at the bottom of this and apply to the eye at night with a bandage. It will speedily draw out all fever and soreness. Strain the liquid through a cloth and use for bathing the eyes occasionally. This is the best eye-water ever made for man or beast. I have used it for twenty years without knowing it to fail.

HUNTER'S PILLS.

These pills can be manufactured at home and are truly reliable, having been sold and used for more than fifty years in Europe. The ingredients may be procured at almost any druggist's. The articles should be all in the powder. Saffron one grain, rue one grain, Scot aloes two grains, savin one grain, cayenne pepper one grain. Mix all into a very thick mass by adding sufficient syrup. Rub some fine starch on the surface of a platter or large dinner-plate, then with your forefinger and thumb nip off a small piece of the mass the size of a pill and roll it in pill form, first dipping your fingers in the starch. Place them as fast as made on the platter, set where they will dry slowly. Put them into a dry bottle or paper box. Dose, one every night and morning as long as occasion requires.

This recipe is worth ten times the price of this book to any female requiring the need of these regulating pills.

HINTS IN REGARD TO HEALTH.

It is plainly seen by an inquiring mind that, aside from the selection and preparation of food, there are many little things constantly arising in the experience of everyday life which, in their combined effect, are powerful agents in the formation (or prevention) of perfect health. A careful observance of these little occurences, an inquiry into the philosophy attending them, lies within the province, and indeed should be considered among the highest duties, of every housekeeper.

That one should be cautious about entering a sick room in a state of perspiration, as the moment you become cool your pores absorb. Do not approach contagious diseases with an empty stomach, nor sit between the sick and the fire, because the heat attracts the vapor.

That the flavor of cod-liver oil may be changed to the delightful one of fresh oyster, if the patient will drink a large glass of water poured from a vessel in which nails have been allowed to rust.

That a bag of hot sand relieves neuralgia.

That warm borax water will remove dandruff.

That salt should be eaten with nuts to aid digestion.

That it rests you, in sewing, to change your position frequently.

That a little soda water will relieve sick headache caused by indigestion.

That a cupful of strong coffee will remove the odor of onions from the breath.

That well-ventilated bedrooms will prevent morning headaches and lassitude.

A cupful of hot water drank before meals will relieve nausea and dyspepsia.

That a fever patient can be made cool and comfortable by frequent sponging off with soda water.

That consumptive night-sweats may be arrested by sponging the body nightly in salt water.

That one in a faint should be laid flat on his back, then loosen his clothes and let him alone.

The best time to bathe is just before going to bed, as any danger of taking cold is thus avoided; and the complexion is improved by keeping warm for several hours after leaving the bath.

To beat the whites of eggs quickly add a pinch of salt. Salt cools, and cold eggs froth rapidly.

Hot, dry flannels, applied as hot as possible, for neuralgia.

Sprains and bruises call for an application of the tincture of arnica.

If an artery is severed, tie a small cord or handkerchief above it.

For bilious colic, soda and ginger in hot water. It may be taken freely.

Tickling in the throat is best relieved by a gargling of salt and water.

Pains in the side are most promptly relieved by the application of mustard.

For cold in the head nothing is better than powdered borax, sniffed up the nostrils.

A drink of hot, strong lemonade before going to bed will often break up a cold and cure a sore throat.

Nervous spasms are usually relieved by a little salt taken into the mouth and allowed to dissolve.

Whooping cough paroxysms are relieved by breathing the fumes of turpentine and carbolic acid.

Broken limbs should be placed in natural positions, and the patient kept quiet until the surgeon arrives.

Hemorrhages of the lungs or stomach are promptly checked by small doses of salt. The patient should be kept as quiet as possible.

Sleeplessness, caused by too much blood in the head may be overcome by applying a cloth wet with cold water to the back of the neck.

Wind colic is promptly relieved by peppermint essence taken in a little warm water. For small children it may be sweetened. Paregoric is also good.

For stomach cramps, ginger ale or a teaspoonful of the tincture of ginger in a half glass of water in which a half teaspoonful of soda has been dissolved.

Sickness of the stomach is most promptly relieved by drinking a teacupful of hot soda and water. If it brings the offending matter up, all the better.

A teaspoonful of ground mustard in a cupful of warm water is a prompt and reliable emetic, and should be resorted to in cases of poisoning or cramps in the stomach from over-eating.

Avoid purgatives or strong physic, as they not only do no good, but are positively hurtful. Pills may relieve for the time, but they seldom cure.

Powdered resin is the best thing to stop bleeding from cuts. After the powder is sprinkled on, wrap the wound with soft cotton cloth. As soon as the wound begins to feel feverish, keep the cloth wet with cold water.

Eggs are considered one of the best remedies for dysentery. Beaten up slightly, with or without sugar, and swallowed, they tend by their emollient qualities to lessen the inflammation of the stomach and intestines, and by forming a transient coating on those organs, enable Nature to resume her healthful sway over the diseased body. Two, or at most, three eggs per day, would be all that is required in ordinary cases; and, since the egg is not merely medicine, but food as well, the lighter the diet otherwise, and the quieter the patient is kept, the more certain and rapid is the recovery.

Hot water is better than cold for bruises. It relieves pain quickly, and by preventing congestion often keeps off the ugly black and blue mark. "Children cry for it," when they experience the relief it affords their bumps and bruises.

For a sprained ankle, the whites of eggs and powdered alum made into a plaster is almost a specific.

MEDICINAL FOOD.

Spinach has a direct effect upon complaints of the kidneys; the common dandelion, used as greens, is excellent for the same trouble; asparagus purifies the blood; celery acts admirably upon the nervous system, and is a cure for rheumatism and neuralgia; tomatoes act upon the liver; beets and turnips are excellent appetizers; lettuce and cucumbers are cooling in their effects upon the system; beans are a very nutritious and strengthening vegetable; while onions, garlic, leeks, chives and shallots, all of which are similar, possess medicinal virtues of a marked character, stimulating the circulatory system, and the consequent increase of the saliva and the gastric juice promoting digestion. Red onions are an excellent diuretic, and the white ones are recommended raw as a remedy for insomnia. They are tonic, nutritious. A soup made from onions is regarded by the French as an excellent restorative in debility of the digestive organs. We might go through the entire list and find each vegetable possessing its especial mission of cure, and it will be plain to every housekeeper that a vegetable diet should be partly adopted, and will prove of great advantage to the health of the family.

HOUSEKEEPERS' TIME-TABLE.

	MODE OF PREPARATION	TIME OF COOKING	TIME OF DIGESTION
		H. M.	H. M.
Apples, sour, hard	Raw		2 50
Apples, sweet and mellow	Raw		1 50
Asparagus	Boiled	15 to 30	2 30
Beans (pod)	Boiled	1 00	2 30
Beans with green corn	Boiled	45	3 45
Beef	Roasted	[^[A]] 25	3 00
Beefsteak	Broiled	15	3 00
Beefsteak	Fried	15	4 00
Beef, salted	Boiled	[^[A]] 35	4 15
Bass, fresh	Broiled	20	3 00
Beets, young	Boiled	2 00	3 45
Beets, old	Boiled	4 30	4 00
Bread, corn	Baked	45	3 15
Bread, wheat	Baked	1 00	3 30
Butter	Melted		3 30
Cabbage	Raw		2 30
Cabbage and vinegar	Raw		2 00
Cabbage	Boiled	1 00	4 30
Cauliflower	Boiled	1-2 00	2 30
Cake, sponge	Baked	45	2 30
Carrot, orange	Boiled	1 00	3 15
Cheese, old	Raw		3 30
Chicken	Fricasseed	1 00	3 45
Codfish, dry and whole	Boiled	[^[A]] 15	2 00
Custard (one quart)	Baked	30	2 45
Duck, tame	Roasted	1 30	4 00
Duck, wild	Roasted	1 00	4 50
Dumpling, apple	Boiled	1 00	3 00
Eggs, hard	Boiled	10	3 30
Eggs, soft	Boiled	3	3 00
Eggs	Fried	5	3 30
Eggs	Raw		2 00
Fowls, domestic, roasted or	Boiled	1 00	4 00
Gelatine	Boiled		2 30
Goose, wild	Roasted	[^[A]] 20	2 30
Lamb	Boiled	[^[A]] 20	2 30
Meat and vegetables	Hashed	30	2 30
Milk	Raw		2 15
Milk	Boiled		2 00
Mutton	Roast	[^[A]] 25	3 15
Mutton	Broiled	20	3 00
Onions	Boiled	1-2 00	3 00
Oysters	Roasted		3 15
Oysters	Stewed	5	3 30
Parsnips	Boiled	1 00	3 00
Pigs' Feet	Soused		1 00
Pork	Roast	[^[A]] 30	5 15
Pork	Boiled	25	4 30
Pork, raw or	Fried		4 15
Pork	Broiled	20	3 15
Potatoes	Boiled	30	3 30
Potatoes	Baked	45	3 30
Potatoes	Roasted	45	2 30
Rice	Boiled	20	1 00
Salmon, fresh	Boiled	8	1 45
Sausage	Fried	25	4 00
Sausage	Broiled	20	3 30
Soup, vegetable	Boiled	1 00	4 00
Soup, chicken	Boiled	2 00	3 00
Soup, oyster or mutton	Boiled	[^[B]]3 30	3 30
Spinach	Boiled	1-2 00	2 30
Tapioca	Boiled	1 30	2 00
Tomatoes	Fresh	1 00	2 30
Tomatoes	Canned	30	2 30
Trout, salmon, fresh, boiled or	Fried	30	1 30
Turkey, boiled or	Roasted	20	2 30
Turnips	Boiled	45	3 30
Veal	Broiled	20	4 00
Venison steak	Broiled	20	1 35

[A] - Minutes to the pound.

[B] - Mutton soup.

The time given is the general average; the time will vary slightly with the quality of the article.

MISCELLANEOUS RECIPES.

USES OF AMMONIA.

All housekeepers should keep a bottle of liquid ammonia, as it is the most powerful and useful agent for cleaning silks, stuffs and hats, in fact cleans everything it touches. A few drops of ammonia in water will take off grease from dishes, pans, etc., and does not injure the hands as much as the use of soda and strong chemical soaps. A spoonful in a quart of warm water for cleaning paint makes it look like new, and so with everything that needs cleaning.

Spots on towels and hosiery will disappear with little trouble if a little ammonia is put into enough water to soak the articles, and they are left in it an hour or two before washing; and if a cupful is put into the water in which clothes are soaked the night before washing, the ease with which the articles can be washed, and their great whiteness and clearness when dried, will be very gratifying. Remembering the small sum paid for three quarts of ammonia of common strength, one can easily see that no bleaching preparation can be more cheaply obtained.

No articles in kitchen use are so likely to be neglected and abused as the dish-cloth and dish-towels; and in washing these, ammonia, if properly used, is a greater comfort than anywhere else. Put a teaspoonful into the water in which these cloths are, or should be, washed everyday; rub soap on the towels. Put them in the water; let them stand half an hour or so; then rub them out thoroughly, rinse faithfully, and dry outdoors in clear air and sun, and dish-cloths and towels need never look gray and dingy—a perpetual discomfort to all housekeepers.

A dark carpet often looks dusty soon after it has been swept, and you know it does not need sweeping again; so wet a cloth or a sponge, wring it almost dry, and wipe off the dust. A few drops of ammonia in the water will brighten the colors.

For cleaning hair-brushes it is excellent; put a tablespoonful into the water, having it only tepid, and dip up and down until clean; then dry with the brushes down and they will be like new ones.

When employed in washing anything that is not especially soiled, use the waste water afterward for the house plants that are taken down from their usual position and immersed in the tub of water. Ammonia is a fertilizer, and helps to keep healthy the plants it nourishes. In every way, in fact, ammonia is the housekeeper's friend.

Ammonia is not only useful for cleaning, but as a household medicine. Half a teaspoonful taken in half a tumbler of water is far better for faintness than alcoholic stimulants. In the Temperance Hospital in London, it is used with the best results. It was used freely by Lieutenant Greely's Arctic party for keeping up circulation. It is a relief in nervousness, headache and heart disturbances.

TO DESTROY INSECTS AND VERMIN.

Dissolve two pounds of alum in three or four quarts of water. Let it remain over night till all the alum is dissolved. Then with a brush, apply boiling hot to every joint or crevice in the closet or shelves where croton bugs, ants, cockroaches, etc., intrude; also to the joints and crevices of bedsteads, as bed bugs dislike it as much as croton bugs, roaches, or ants. Brush all the cracks in the floor and mop-boards. Keep it boiling hot while using.

To keep woolens and furs from moths, be sure that none are in the articles when they are put away; then take a piece of strong brown paper, with not a hole through which even a pin can enter. Put the article in it with several lumps of gum camphor between the folds; place this in a close box or trunk. Cover every joint with paper. A piece of cotton cloth, if thick and firm, will answer. Wherever a knitting-needle can pass, the parent moth can enter.

Place pieces of camphor, cedar-wood, Russia leather, tobacco-leaves, whole cloves, or anything strongly aromatic, in the drawers or boxes where furs and other things to be preserved from moths are kept and they will never be harmed. Mice never get into drawers or trunks where gum camphor is placed.

Another Recipe.—Mix half a pint of alcohol, the same quantity of turpentine and two ounces of camphor. Keep in a stone bottle and shake well before using. The clothes or furs are to be wrapped in linen, and crumbled-up pieces of blotting-paper dipped in the liquid to be placed in the box with them, so that it smells strong. This requires renewing but once a year.

Another authority says that a positive, sure recipe is this: Mix equal quantities of pulverized borax, camphor gum and saltpetre together, making a powder. Sprinkle it dry under the edges of carpets, in drawers, trunks, etc., etc. It will also keep out all kinds of insects, if plentifully used. If the housekeeper will begin at the top of her house with a powder bellows and a large quantity of this fresh powder, and puff it thoroughly into every crack and crevice, whether or not there are croton bugs in them, to the very bottom of her house, special attention being paid to old furniture, closets, and wherever croton water is introduced, she will be freed from these torments. The operation may require a repetition, but the end is success.

MOTHS IN CARPETS.

If you fear that they are at work at the edge of the carpet, it will sometimes suffice to lay a wet towel, and press a hot flat-iron over it; but the best way is to take the carpet up, and clean it, and give a good deal of attention to the floor. Look in the cracks, and if you discover signs of moths, wash the floor with benzine, and scatter red pepper on it before putting the carpet lining down.

Heavy carpets sometimes do not require taking up every year, unless in constant use. Take out the tacks from these, fold the carpets back, wash the floor in strong suds with a tablespoonful of borax dissolved in it. Dash with insect powder, or lay with tobacco leaves along the edge, and re-tack. Or use turpentine, the enemy of buffalo moths, carpet worms and other insects that injure and destroy carpets. Mix the turpentine with pure water in the proportion of three tablespoonfuls to three quarts of water, and then after the carpet has been well swept, go over each breadth carefully with a sponge dipped in the solution and wrung nearly dry. Change the water as often as it becomes dirty. The carpet will be nicely cleaned as well as disinfected. All moths can be kept away and the eggs destroyed by this means. Spots may be renovated by the use of ox-gall or ammonia and water.

A good way to brighten a carpet is to put half a tumbler of spirits of turpentine in a basin of water, and dip your broom in it and sweep over the carpet once or twice and it will restore the color and brighten it up until you would think it new. Another good way to clean old carpets is to rub them over with meal; just dampen it a very little and rub the carpet with it and when perfectly dry, sweep over with meal. After a carpet is thoroughly swept, rub it with a cloth dipped in water and ammonia; it will brighten the colors and make it look like new.

TO TAKE OUT MACHINE GREASE.

Cold water, a tablespoonful of ammonia and soap, will take out machine grease where other means would not answer on account of colors running, etc.

TO WASH FLANNELS.

The first thing to consider in washing flannels so that they retain their size, is that the articles be washed and rinsed in water of the same temperature, that is, about as warm as the hands can bear, and not allowed to cool between. The water should be a strong suds. Bub through two soapy waters; wring them out, and put into plenty of clear, clean, warm water to rinse. Then into another of the same temperature, blued a little. Wring, shake them well and hang up. Do not take out of this warm water and hang out in a freezing air, as that certainly tends to shrink them. It is better to dry them in the house, unless the sun shines. They should dry quickly. Colored flannels should never be washed in the same water after white clothes, or they will be covered, when dry, with lint; better be washed in a water for themselves. In washing worsteds, such as merino dress goods, pursue the same course, only do not wring them hard; shake, hang them up and let drain. While a little damp, bring in and press smoothly on the wrong side with as hot an iron as can be used without scorching the goods.

Flannels that have become yellow from being badly washed, may be nicely whitened by soaking them two or three hours in a lather made of one-quarter of a pound of soft soap, two tablespoonfuls of powdered borax and two tablespoonfuls of carbonate of ammonia, dissolved in five or six gallons of water.

TO STARCH, FOLD AND IRON SHIRTS.

To three tablespoonfuls of dry, fine starch allow a quart of water. First wet the starch smooth in a little cold water in a tin pan, put into it a little pinch of salt and a piece of enamel, or shirt polish the size of a bean, or a piece of clean tallow, or a piece of butter the size of a cranberry; pour over this a quart of boiling water, stirring rapidly, placing it over the fire. Cook until clear, then remove it from the fire and set the pan in another of warm water to keep the starch warm.

Turn the shirt wrong side out and dip the bosom in the hot starch as warm as the hands can bear the heat; rub the starch evenly through the linen, saturating it thoroughly; wring hard to make dry as possible. Starch the collar and wristbands the same way, then hang them out to dry. Three hours before ironing them, wet the bosom and cuffs in cold water, wring out, shake and fold, roll up tightly, wrap in a towel and let remain two or three hours.

The back of the shirt should be ironed first by doubling it lengthwise through the centre, the wristbands may be ironed next, and both sides of the sleeves, then the collar band; now place a bosom board under the bosom and with a fresh clean napkin dampened a little, rub the bosom from the top toward the bottom, arranging and smoothing each plait neatly; then with a smooth, moderately-hot flat-iron, begin ironing from the top downward, pressing hard until the bosom becomes smooth, dry and glossy. Remove the bosom board and iron the front, fold both sides of the shirt towards the centre of the back, fold together below the bosom and hang on the bars to air.

CLEANING OIL-CLOTHS.

A dingy oil-cloth may be brightened by washing it with clear water with a little borax dissolved in it; wipe it with a flannel cloth that you have dipped into milk and then wring as dry as possible.

TO CLEAN BLACK LACE. No. 1.

A teaspoonful of gum arabic dissolved in one teacupful of boiling water; when cool, add half a teaspoonful of black ink; dip the lace and spread smoothly between the folds of a newspaper and press dry with book or the like. Lace shawls can be dressed over in this way, by pinning a sheet to the carpet and stretching the shawl upon that; or black lace can be cleaned the same as ribbon and silk. Take an old kid glove (black preferable), no matter how old, and boil it in a pint of water for a short time; then let it cool until the leather can be taken in the hand without burning; use the glove to sponge off the ribbon; if the ribbon is very dirty, dip it into water and draw through the fingers a few times before sponging. After cleaning, lay a piece of paper over the ribbon and iron; paper is better than cloth. The ribbon will look like new.

TO CLEAN BLACK LACE. No. 2.

Black laces of all kinds may be cleaned by alcohol. Throw them boldly into the liquid; churn them up and down till they foam; if very dusty, use the second dose of alcohol; squeeze them out, "spat" them, pull out the edges, lay them between brown paper, smooth and straight; leave under a heavy weight till dry; do not iron.

TO WASH WHITE LACE. No. 1.

First, the soiled laces should be carefully removed from the garment and folded a number of times, keeping the edges evenly together, then basted with a coarse thread without a knot in the end. Now put them in a basin of luke-warm suds. After soaking a half hour, rub them carefully between the hands, renewing the suds several times; then, after soaping them well, place them in cold water and let them come to a scald. Take them from this and rinse them thoroughly in luke-warm water, blued a very little, then dip them into a very thin, clear starch, allowing a teaspoonful of starch to a pint of water, so thin that it will be scarcely preceptible. Now roll them in a clean, fresh towel without taking out the bastings; let them lie for an hour or more, iron over several thicknesses of flannel, taking out the bastings of one piece at a time, and ironing on the wrong side, with a moderately-hot iron; the laces should be nearly dry, and the edges and points pulled gently with the fingers into shape, before ironing.

TO WASH WHITE THREAD LACE. No. 2.

To wash white lace, cover a bottle with linen, stitched smoothly to fit the shape. Wind the lace about it, basting both edges to the linen. Wash on the bottle, soaping and rinsing well, then boil in soft water. Dry in the sun. Clip the basting threads and do not iron. If carefully done it will look like new lace.

TO CLEAN SILKS OR RIBBONS.

Half a pint of gin, half a pound of honey, half a pound of soft soap, one-eighth of a pint of water.

Mix the above ingredients together; then lay each breadth of silk upon a clean kitchen table or dresser, and scrub it well on the soiled side with the mixture. Have ready three vessels of cold water; take each piece of silk at two corners, and dip it up and down in each vessel, but do not wring it; and take care that each breadth has one vessel of quite clean water for the last dip. Hang it up dripping for a minute or two, then dab in a cloth, and iron it quickly with a very hot iron.

Where the lace or silk is very much soiled, it is best to pass them through a warm liquor of bullock's gall and water; rinse in cold water; then take a small piece of glue, pour boiling water on it, and pass the veil through it, clap it, and frame to dry. Instead of framing, it may be fastened with drawing-pins closely fixed upon a very clean paste, or drawing-board.

TO CLEAN BLACK DRESS SILKS.

One of the things "not generally known," at least in this country, is the Parisian method of cleaning black silk; the modus operandi is very simple, and the result infinitely superior to that achieved in any other manner. The silk must be thoroughly brushed and wiped with a cloth, then laid flat on a board or table, and well sponged with hot coffee, thoroughly freed from sediment by being strained through muslin. The silk is sponged on the side intended to show; it is allowed to become partially dry, and then ironed on the wrong side. The coffee removes every particle of grease, and restores the brilliancy of silk, without imparting to it either the shiny appearance or crackly and papery stiffness obtained by beer, or, indeed, any other liquid. The silk really appears thickened by the process, and this good effect is permanent. Our readers who will experimentalize on an apron or cravat, will never again try any other method.

TO WASH FEATHERS.

Wash in warm soap-suds and rinse in water a very little blued; if the feather is white, then let the wind dry it. When the curl has come out by washing the feather or getting it damp, place a hot flat-iron so that you can hold the feather just above it while curling. Take a bone or silver knife, and draw the fibres of the feather between the thumb and the dull edge of the knife, taking not more than three fibres at a time, beginning at the point of the feather and curling one-half the other way. The hot iron makes the curl more durable. After a little practice one can make them look as well as new feathers. Or they can be curled by holding them over the stove or range, not near enough to burn; withdraw and shake out; then hold them over again until they curl. When swansdown becomes soiled, it can be washed and look as good as new. Tack strips on a piece of muslin and wash in warm water with white soap, then rinse and hang in the wind to dry. Rip from the muslin and rub carefully between the fingers to soften the leather.

INCOMBUSTIBLE DRESSES.

By putting an ounce of alum or sal ammoniac in the last water in which muslins or cottons are rinsed, or a similar quantity in the starch in which they are stiffened, they will be rendered almost uninflammable; or, at least, will with difficulty take the fire, and if they do, will burn without flame. It is astonishing that this simple precaution is so rarely adopted. Remember this and save the lives of your children.

HOW TO FRESHEN UP FURS.

Furs when taken out in the fall are often found to have a mussed, crushed-out appearance. They can be made to look like new, by following these simple directions: Wet the fur with a hair-brush, brushing up the wrong way of the fur. Leave it to dry in the air for about half an hour, and then give it a good beating on the right side with a rattan. After beating it, comb it with a coarse comb, combing up the right way of the fur.

NOVEL DRESS MENDING.

A novel way of mending a woolen or silk dress in which a round hole has been torn, and where only a patch could remedy matters, is the following: The frayed portions around the tear should be carefully smoothed, and a piece of the material, moistened with very thin muscilage, placed under the hole. A heavy weight should be put upon it until it is dry, when it is only possible to discover the mended place by careful observation.

TO RENEW OLD CRAPE.

Place a little water in a tea-kettle, and let it boil until there is plenty of steam from the spout; then, holding the crape in both hands, pass it to and fro several times through the steam, and it will be clean and look nearly equal to new.

TO RAISE THE PILE ON VELVET.

To raise the pile on velvet, put on a table two pieces of wood; place between them, bottom side up, three very hot flat-irons, and over them lay a wet cloth; hold the velvet over the cloth, with the wrong side down; when thoroughly steamed, brush the pile with a light wisp, and the velvet will look as good as new.

TO CLEAN KID GLOVES.

Make a thick mucilage by boiling a handful of flax-seed; add a little dissolved toilet soap; then, when the mixture cools, put the gloves on the hands and rub them with a piece of white flannel wet with the mixture. Do not wet the gloves through. Or take a fine, clean, soft cloth, dip it into a little sweet milk, then rub it on a cake of soap, and rub the gloves with it; they will, look like new.

Another good way to clean any color of kid gloves is to pour a little benzine into a basin and wash the gloves in it, rubbing and squeezing them until clean. If much soiled, they must be washed through clean benzine, and rinsed in a fresh supply. Hang up in the air to dry.

STARCH POLISH.

Take one ounce of spermaceti and one ounce of white wax; melt and run it into a thin cake on a plate. A piece the size of a quarter dollar added to a quart of prepared starch gives a beautiful lustre to the clothes and prevents the iron from sticking.

FOR CLEANING JEWELRY.

For cleaning jewelry there is nothing better than ammonia and water. If very dull or dirty, rub a little soap on a soft brush and brush them in this wash, rinse in cold water, dry first in an old handkerchief and then rub with buck or chamois skin. Their freshness and brilliancy when thus cleaned cannot be surpassed by any compound used by jewelers.

TO CLEAN SILVER PLATE.

Wash well in strong, warm soap-suds, rinse and wipe dry with a dry soft cloth; then mix as much hartshorn powder as will be required into a thick paste, with cold water; spread this over the silver, with a soft cloth, and leave it for a little time to dry. When perfectly dry brush it off with a clean soft cloth, or brush and polish it with a piece of chamois skin. Hartshorn is one of the best possible ingredients for plate powder for daily use. It leaves on the silver a deep, dark polish, and at the same time does not injure it. Whiting, dampened with liquid ammonia, is excellent also.

TO REMOVE STAINS FROM MARBLE.

Mix together one-half pound of soda, one-half pound of soft soap and one pound of whiting. Boil them until they become as thick as paste, and let it cool. Before it is quite cold, spread it over the surface of the marble and leave it at least a whole day. Use soft water to wash it off, and rub it well with soft cloths. For a black marble, nothing it better than spirits of turpentine.

Another paste answers the same purpose: Take two parts of soda, one of pumice stone and one of finely-powdered chalk. Sift these through a fine sieve and mix them into a paste with water. Rub this well all over the marble and the stains will be removed; then wash it with soap and water and a beautiful bright polish will be produced.

TO WHITEN WALLS.

To whiten walls, scrape off all the old whitewash, and wash the walls with a solution of two ounces of white vitriol to four gallons of water. Soak a quarter of a pound of white glue in water for twelve hours; strain and place in a tin pail in a kettle of boiling water. When melted, stir in the glue eight pounds of whiting and water enough to make it as thick as common whitewash. Apply evenly with a good brush. If the walls are very yellow, blue the water slightly by squeezing in it a flannel blue-bag.

Before kalsomining a wall all cracks should be plastered over. Use plaster of Paris. Kalsomine may be colored easily by mixing with it yellow ochre, Spanish brown, indigo; squeeze through a bag into the water, etc.

PAPER-HANGERS' PASTE.

To make paper-hangers' paste, beat up four pounds of good, white wheat flour (well sifted previously) in sufficient cold water to form a stiff batter. Beat it well in order to take out all lumps, and then add enough cold water to make the mixture of the consistency of pudding batter. To this add about two ounces of well-pounded alum. Pour gently and quickly over the batter boiling water, stirring rapidly at the same time, and when it is seen to lose the white color of the flour, it is cooked and ready. Do not use it, however, while hot, but allow it to cool. Pour about a pint of cold water over the top to prevent a skin from forming. Before using, the paste should be thinned by the addition of cold water.

TO WASH COLORED GARMENTS.

Delicately colored socks and stockings are apt to fade in washing. If they are soaked for a night in a pail of tepid water containing a half pint of turpentine, then wrung out and dried, the colors will "set," and they can afterwards be washed without fading.

For calicoes that fade, put a teaspoonful of sugar of lead into a pailful of water and soak the garment fifteen minutes before washing.

THE MARKING SYSTEM.

Mark all your own personal wardrobe which has to be washed. If this were invariably done, a great deal of property would be saved and a great deal of trouble would be spared. For the sake of saving trouble to others, if for no other reason, all of one's handkerchiefs, collars and underclothing should be plainly and permanently marked. A bottle of indelible ink is cheap, a clean pen still cheaper, and a bright, sunny day or a hot flat-iron will complete the business. Always keep on hand a stick of linen tape, written over its whole length with your name, or the names of your family, ready to be cut off and sewed on to stockings and such other articles as do not afford a good surface on which to mark.

Then there are the paper patterns, of which every mother has a store. On the outside of each, as it is tied up, the name of the pattern should be plainly written. There are the rolls of pieces, which may contain a good deal not apparent from the outside. All these hidden mysteries should be indicated. The winter things, which are wrapped up and put away for summer, and the summer things, which are wrapped up and put away for the winter, should all be in labeled packages, and every packing trunk should have on its lid a complete list of its contents.

Congregationalist

TO REMOVE STAINS AND SPOTS.

Children's clothes, table linens, towels, etc., should be thoroughly examined before wetting, as soap-suds, washing-fluids, etc., will fix almost any stain past removal. Many stains will pass away by being simply washed in pure, soft water; or alcohol will remove, before the article has been in soap-suds, many stains; iron mold, mildew, or almost any similar spot, can be taken out by dipping in diluted citric acid; then cover with salt and lay in the bright sun till the stain disappears. If of long standing, it may be necessary to repeat the wetting and the sunlight. Be careful to rinse in several waters as soon as the stain is no longer visible. Ink, fruit, wine, and mildew stains must first be washed in clear, cold water, removing as much of the spots as can be, then mix one teaspoonful of oxalic acid and a half pint of rain-water. Dip the stain in this and wipe off in clear water. Wash at once, if a fabric that will bear washing. A tablespoonful of white currant juice, if any can be had, is even better than lemon. This preparation may be used on the most delicate articles without injury. Shake it up before using it. Mark it "poison," and put it where it will not be meddled with.

OIL STAINS IN SILKS AND OTHER FABRICS.

Benzine is most effectual, not only for silk, but for any other material whatever. It can be procured from any druggist. By simply covering both sides of greased silk with magnesia, and allowing it to remain for a few hours, the oil is absorbed by the powder. Should the first application be insufficient, it may be repeated, and even rubbed in with the hand. Should the silk be Tussah or Indian silk, it will wash.

To remove an acid stain on violet silk: Brush the discoloration with tincture of iodine, then saturate the spot well with a solution of hyposulphite of soda, and dry gradually. This restores the original color perfectly.

Muriatic acid is successfully used for removing ink stains and iron mold on a number of colors which it does not attack.

Sulphurous acid is only employed for whitening undyed goods, straw hats, etc., and for removing the stains of certain fruits on silks and woolens. Sulphurous gas is also used for this purpose, but the liquid gas is safer.

Oxalic acid is used for removing ink and rust stains, and remnants of mud stains, which do not yield to other deterrents. It may also be used for destroying the stains of fruits and astringent juices, and old stains of urine. However, its use is limited to white goods, as it attacks fugitive colors and even light shades of those reputed to be fast. The best method of applying it is to dissolve it in cold or luke-warm water, to let it remain a moment upon the spot, and then rub it with the fingers. Wash out in clear, warm water immediately.

Citric acid serves to revive and brighten certain colors, especially greens and yellows. It restores scarlets which have been turned to a crimson by the action of alkalies. Acetic acid or tartaric acid may be used instead.

Where it is feared that soap may change the color of an article, as, for instance, scarlet hosiery or lilac print, if the garment be not badly soiled, it may be cleansed by washing without soap in water in which pared potatoes have been boiled. This method will also prevent color from running in washing prints.

To prevent blue from running into a white ground, dissolve a teaspoonful of copperas in a pailful of soft water, add a piece of lime the size of an acorn, and soak the garments in this water two hours before washing. To keep colors from running in washing black prints, put a teaspoon of black pepper in the first water.

Salt or beef's gall in the water helps to set black. A tablespoonful of spirits of turpentine to a gallon of water sets most blues, and alum is very efficacious in setting green. Black or very dark calicoes should be stiffened with gum arabic—five cents' worth is enough for a dress. If, however, starch is used, the garment should be turned wrong side out.

A simple way to remove grass stains is to spread butter on them, and lay the article in hot sunshine, or wash in alcohol. Fruit stains upon cloth or the hands may be removed by rubbing with the juice of ripe tomatoes. If applied immediately, powdered starch will also take fruit stains out of table linen. Left on the spot for a few hours, it absorbs every trace of the stain.

For mildew stains or iron rust, mix together soft soap, laundry starch, half as much salt, and the juice of a lemon. Apply to the spots and spread the garment on the grass. Or wet the linen, rub into it white soap, then finely powdered chalk; lay upon the grass and keep damp. Old mildew stains may be removed by rubbing yellow soap on both sides and afterwards laying on, very thick, starch which has been dampened. Rub in well and expose to light and air. There are several effectual methods of removing grease from cloths. First, wet with a linen cloth dipped in chloroform. Second, mix four tablespoonfuls of alcohol with one tablespoonful of salt; shake together until the salt is dissolved and apply with a sponge. Third, wet with weak ammonia water; then lay a thin white blotting or tissue paper over it and iron lightly with an iron not too hot. Fourth, apply a mixture of equal parts of alcohol, gin and ammonia.

Candle grease yields to a warm iron. Place a piece of blotting or other absorbing paper under the absorbing fabric; put a piece of the paper also on the spot, apply the warm iron to the paper and as soon as a spot of grease appears, move the paper and press again until the spot disappears. Lard will remove wagon grease. Rub the spot with the lard as if washing it, and when it is well out, wash in the ordinary way with soap and water until thoroughly cleansed.

To make linen beautifully white, prepare the water for washing by putting into every ten gallons a large handful of powdered borax or boil with the clothes one teaspoonful of spirits of turpentine.

Fruit stains may be taken out by boiling water. Place the material over a basin or other vessel and pour the boiling water from the kettle over the stains.

Pure water, cold or hot, mixed with acids, serves for rinsing goods in order to remove foreign and neutral bodies which cover the color. Steam softens fatty matters and thus facilitates their removal by reagents.

Sulphuric acid may be used in certain cases, particularly for brightening and raising greens, reds, yellows, etc., but it must be diluted with at least one hundred times its weight of water and more in cases of delicate shades.

CEMENT FOR CHINA AND GLASS.

To half a pint of milk put an equal quantity of vinegar in order to curdle it; then separate the curd from the whey and mix the whey with the whites of four or five eggs, beating the whole well together. When it is well-mixed, add a little quick-lime, through a sieve, until it has acquired the consistency of a thick paste. With this cement broken vessels and cracks of all kinds may be mended. It dries quickly and resists the action of fire and water.

Another: Into a thick solution of gum arabic, stir plaster of Paris until the mixture assumes the consistency of cream; apply with a brush to the broken edges of china and join together. In three days the article cannot be broken in the same place. The whiteness of the cement adds to its value.

CLEANING SINKS.

To purify greasy sinks and pipes, pour down a pailful of boiling water in which three or four pounds of washing soda have been dissolved. A disinfectant is prepared in the same way, using copperas. Copperas is a poison and should not be left about.

Leaks in Waste Pipes:—Shut yourself into a room from which the pipe starts. Put two or three ounces of oil of peppermint into a pail of boiling hot water and pour down the pipe. Another person who has not yet inhaled the strong odor should follow the course of the pipe through the house. The peppermint will be pretty sure to discover a break that even an expert plumber might overlook.

The Examiner.

MANAGEMENT OF STOVES.

If the fire in a stove has plenty of fresh coals on top not yet burned through it will need only a little shaking to start it up; but if the fire looks dying and the coals look white, don't shake it. When it has drawn till it is red again, if there is much ash and little fire, put coals on very carefully. A mere handful of fire can be coaxed back into life by adding another handful or so of new coals on the red spot, and giving plenty of draught, but don't shake a dying fire, or you lose it. This management is often necessary after a warm spell, when the stove has been kept dormant for days, though I hope you will not be so unfortunate as to have a fire to coax up on a cold winter morning. They should be arranged over night, so that all that is required is to open the draughts in order to have a cherry glow in a few minutes.

Good Housekeeping

TO REMOVE INK FROM CARPETS.

When freshly spilled, ink can be removed from carpets by wetting in milk. Take cotton batting and soak up all the ink that it will receive, being careful not to let it spread. Then take fresh cotton, wet in milk, and sop it up carefully. Repeat this operation, changing cotton and milk each time. After most of the ink has been taken up in this way, with fresh cotton and clean, rub the spot. Continue till all disappears; then wash the spot in clean warm water and a little soap; rinse in clear water and rub till nearly dry. If the ink is dried in, we know of no way that will not take the color from the carpet as well as the ink, unless the ink is on a white spot. In that case, salts of lemon, or soft soap, starch and lemon juice, will remove the ink as easily as if on cotton.

TO TAKE RUST OUT OF STEEL.

If possible, place the article in a bowl containing kerosene oil, or wrap the steel up in a soft cloth well saturated with kerosene; let it remain twenty-four hours or longer, then scour the rusty spots with brick dust; if badly rusted, use salt wet with hot vinegar; after scouring rinse every particle of brick dust or salt off with boiling hot water; dry thoroughly with flannel cloths and place near the fire to make sure, then polish off with a clean flannel cloth and a little sweet oil.

TO MAKE A PASTE OR MUCILAGE TO FASTEN LABLES.

Soften good glue in water, then boil it with strong vinegar and thicken the liquid, during boiling, with fine wheat flour, so that a paste results; or starch paste with which a little Venice turpentine has been incorporated while it was warm.

A recipe for a transparent cement which possesses great tenacity and has not the slightest yellow tinge: Mix in a well-stoppered bottle ten drachms of chloroform with ten and one-half of non-vulcanized caoutchouc (rubber) cut in small pieces. Solution is readily effected and when it is completed add two and one-half drachms of mastic. Let the whole macerate from eight to ten days without the application of any heat and shake the contents of the bottle at intervals. A perfectly white and very adhesive cement is the result.

POSTAGE STAMP MUCILAGE.

Take of gum dextrine two parts, acetic acid one part, water five parts. Dissolve in a water bath and add alcohol one part.

Scientific American.

Gum of great strength, which will also keep for a long time, is prepared by dissolving equal parts of gum arabic and gum tragacanth in vinegar. A little vinegar added to ordinary gum water will make it keep much better.

FAMILY GLUE.

Crack the glue and put it in a bottle, add common whisky; shake up, cork tight, and in three or four days it can be used. It requires no heating, will keep for almost any length of time, and is at all times, ready to use, except in the coldest of weather, when it will require warming. It must be kept tight, so that the whisky will not evaporate. The usual corks or stoppers should not be used. It will become clogged. A tin stopper covering the bottle, but fitting as closely as possible, must be used.

GLUE.

Glue to resist heat and moisture is made as follows: Mix a handful of quick-lime in four ounces of linseed oil, boil to a good thickness, then spread it on tin plates in the shade, and it will become very hard, but may be easily dissolved over the fire as glue.

A glue which will resist the action of water is made by boiling one pound of common glue in two quarts of skimmed milk.

FURNITURE CREAM.

Shred finely two ounces of beeswax and half an ounce of white wax into half a pint of turpentine; set in a warm place until dissolved, then pour over the mixture the following, boiled together until melted: Half a pint of water, an ounce of castile soap and a piece or resin the size of a small nutmeg. Mix thoroughly and keep in a wide-necked stone bottle for use. This cleans well and leaves a good polish, and may be made at a fourth of the price it is sold at.

CEMENT CRACKS IN FLOOR.

Cracks in floors may be neatly but permanently filled by thoroughly soaking newspapers in paste made of half a pound of flour, three quarts of water and half a pound of alum mixed and boiled. The mixture will be about as thick as putty, and may be forced into the crevice with a case knife. It will harden like papier-mache.

A POLISH FOR LADIES' KID SHOES.

A fine liquid polish for ladies' kid shoes, satchels, etc., that is easy of application, recommended as containing no ingredients in any manner injurious to leather, is found by digesting in a closed vessel at gentle heat, and straining, a solution made as follows: Lampblack one drachm, oil turpentine four drachms, alcohol (trymethyl) twelve ounces, shellac one and one-half ounces, white turpentine five drachms, saudarac two drachms.

PASTE FOR SCRAP BOOKS, ETC.

Paste that Will Keep.—Dissolve a teaspoonful of alum in a quart of water. When cold, stir in flour, to give it the consistency of thick cream, being particular to beat up all the lumps. Stir in as much powdered resin as will lie on a dime, and throw in half a dozen cloves to give it a pleasant odor. Have on the fire a teacupful of boiling water; pour the flour mixture into it, stirring well all the time. In a few minutes it will be of the consistency of molasses. Pour it into an earthen or china vessel, let it cool, and stir in a small teaspoonful each of oil of cloves and of sassafras; lay a cover on, and put in a cool place. When needed for use, take out a portion and soften it with warm water. This is a fine paste to use to stiffen embroidery.

TO REMOVE INDELIBLE INK.

Most indelible inks contain nitrate of silver, the stain of which may be removed by first soaking in a solution of common salt, and afterward washing with ammonia. Or use solution of ten grains of cyanide of potassium and five grains of iodine to one ounce of water, or a solution of eight parts each bichloride of mercury and chloride of ammonium in one hundred and twenty-five parts of water.

A CEMENT FOR ACIDS.

A cement which is proof against boiling acids may be made by a composition of India rubber, tallow, lime and red lead. The India rubber must first be melted by a gentle heat, and then six to eight per cent by weight of tallow is added to the mixture while it is kept well stirred; next day slaked lime is applied, until the fluid mass assumes a consistency similar to that of soft paste; lastly, twenty per cent of red lead is added in order to make it harden and dry.

TO KEEP CIDER.

Allow three-fourths of a pound of sugar to the gallon, the whites of six eggs, well beaten, a handful of common salt. Leave it open until fermentation ceases, then bung up. This process a dealer of cider has used for years, and always successfully.

Another Recipe.—To keep cider sweet allow it to work until it has reached the state most desirable to the taste, and then add one and a half tumblers of grated horse-radish to each barrel, and shake up well. This arrests further fermentation. After remaining a few weeks, rack off and bung up closely in clean casks.

A gentleman of Denver writes he has a sure preservative: Put eight gallons of cider at a time into a clean barrel; take one ounce of powdered charcoal and one ounce of powdered sulphur; mix and put it into some iron vessel that will go down through the bung-hole of the barrel. Now put a piece of red-hot iron into the charcoal and sulphur, and while it is burning, lower it through the bung-hole to within one foot of the cider, and suspend it there by a piece of wire. Bring it up and in twelve hours you can cure another batch. Put the cider in a tight barrel and keep in a cool cellar and it will keep for years.

A Holland Recipe.—To one quart of new milk, fresh from the cow (not strained), add one half pound of ground black mustard seed and six eggs. Beat the whole well together and pour into a barrel of cider. It will keep cider sweet for one year or more.

TO BLEACH COTTON CLOTH.

Take one large spoonful of sal soda and one pound of chloride lime for thirty yards; dissolve in clean, soft water; rinse the cloth thoroughly in cold, soft water so that it may not rot. This amount of cloth may be bleached in fourteen or fifteen minutes.

A POLISH FOR LEATHER.

Put a half-pound of shellac broken up in small pieces into a quart bottle or jug, cover it with alcohol, cork it tight, and put it on the shelf in a warm place; shake it well several times a day, then add a piece of camphor as large as a hen's egg; shake it well, and in a few hours shake it again and add one ounce of lampblack. If the alcohol is good, it will all be dissolved in two days; then shake and use. If the materials were of the proper kind, the polish correctly prepared, it will dry in about five minutes, giving a gloss equal to patent leather. Using aniline dyes instead of the lampblack, you can have it any desired color, and it can be used on wood or hard paper.

TO SOFTEN WATER.

Add half a pound of the best quick-lime dissolved in water to every hundred gallons. Smaller proportions may be more conveniently managed, and if allowed to stand a short time the lime will have united with the carbonate of lime, and been deposited at the bottom of the receptacle. Another way is to put a gallon of lye into a barrelful of water, or two or three shovelfuls of wood-ashes, let stand over night; it will be clear and soft.

WASHING FLUID.

One gallon of water and four pounds of ordinary washing soda, and a quarter of a pound of soda. Heat the water to boiling hot, put in the soda, boil about five minutes, then pour it over two pounds of unslaked lime, let it bubble and foam until it settles, turn it off and bottle it for use. This is the article that is used in the Chinese laundries for whitening their linen, and is called "Javelle water;" a tablespoonful put into a suds of three gallons, and a little, say a quarter of a cupful, in the boiler when boiling the clothes, makes them very white and clear. Must be well rinsed afterwards. This preparation will remove tea stains and almost all ordinary stains of fruit, grass, etc. This fluid brightens the colors of colored clothes, does not rot them, but should not be left long in any water; the boiling, sudsing, rinsing and bluing, should be done in quick succession, until the clothes are ready to hang on the line.

HARD SOAP. (Washing.)

Six pounds of washing soda and three of unslaked lime. Pour on four gallons of boiling water, let it stand until perfectly clear, then drain off, and put in six pounds of clean fat. Boil it until it begins to harden, about two hours, stirring most of the time. While boiling, thin it with two gallons of cold water, which you have previously poured on the alkaline mixture, after draining off the four gallons. This must be settled clear before it is drawn off. Add it when there is danger of boiling over. Try the thickness by cooling a little on a plate. Put in a handful of salt just before taking from the fire. Wet a tub to prevent sticking; turn in the soap and let it stand until solid. Cut into bars, put on a board and let it dry. This makes about forty pounds of soap. It can be flavored just as you turn it out.

SOAP FOR WASHING WITHOUT RUBBING.

A soap to clean clothes without rubbing: Take two pounds of sal soda, two pounds of common bar soap and ten quarts of water. Cut the soap in thin slices and boil together two hours; strain and it will be fit for use. Put the clothes in soak the night before you wash, and to every pailful of water in which you boil them add a pound of soap. They will need no rubbing, but merely rinsing.

TO MAKE SOFT SOAP WITHOUT COOKING.

Pour two pailfuls of boiling water upon twenty pounds of potash and let it stand two hours. Have ready thirty pounds of clean grease, upon which pour one pailful of the lye, adding another pail of water to the potash; let it stand three or four hours, stir it well; then pour a gallon of the lye upon the grease, stir it well; and in half an hour another gallon of the lye, stir it thoroughly; in half an hour repeat the process, and thus proceed until you have poured off all the lye; then add two pails of boiling hot water to the remainder of the potash, and let it stand ten hours; then stir the mixture, and if it has become stiff and the grease has disappeared from the surface, take out a little and see whether the weak lye will thicken it; if it does, add the lye; if it does not, try water, and if that thickens it, let it stand another day, stirring it well five or six times during the day; if the lye does not separate from the grease you may fill up with water.

OLD-STYLE FAMILY SOFT SOAP.

To set the leach, bore several holes in the bottom of a barrel, or use one without a bottom; prepare a board larger than the barrel, then set the barrel on it, and cut a groove around just outside the barrel, making one groove from this to the edge of the board, to carry off the lye as it runs off, with a groove around it, running into one in the centre of the board. Place all two feet from the ground and tip it so that the lye may run easily from the board into the vessel below prepared to receive it. Put half bricks or stones around the edge of the inside of the barrel; place on them one end of some sticks about two inches wide, inclining to the centre; on those place some straw to the depth of two inches, over it scatter two pounds of slaked lime. Put in ashes, about half of a bushel at a time, pack it well, by pounding it down, and continue doing so until the barrel is full, leaving a funnel-shaped hollow in the centre large enough to hold several quarts of water. Use rain-water boiling hot. Let the water disappear before adding more. If the ashes are packed very tightly it may require two or three days before the lye will begin to run, but it will be the stronger for it, and much better.

To Make Boiled Soft Soap.—Put in a kettle the grease consisting of all kinds of fat that has accumulated in the kitchen, such as scraps and bones from the soup-kettle, rinds from meat, etc.; fill the kettle half full; if there is too much grease it can be skimmed off after the soap is cold, for another kettle of soap. This is the only true test when enough grease is used, as the lye will consume all that is needed and no more. Make a fire under one side of it. The kettle should be in an out-house or out of doors. Let it heat very hot so as to fry; stir occasionally to prevent burning. Now put in the lye a gallon at a time, watching it closely until it boils, as it sometimes runs over at the beginning. Add lye until the kettle is full enough, but not too full to boil well. Soap should boil from the side and not the middle, as this would be more likely to cause it to boil over. To test the soap, to one spoonful of soap add one of rain-water; if it stirs up very thick, the soap is good and will keep; if it becomes thinner, it is not good. This is the result of one of three causes, either it is too weak, or there is a deposit of dirt or it is too strong. Continue to boil for a few hours, when it should flow from the stick with which it is stirred like thick molasses; but if after boiling it remains thin, let it stand over night, removing it from the fire, then drain it off very carefully into another vessel, being very particular to prevent any sediment from passing. Wash the kettle, return the soap and boil again, if dirt was the cause; it will now be thick and good; otherwise if it was too strong, rain-water added will make it right, adding the water gradually until right and just thick enough.

FACTS WORTH KNOWING.

An Agreeable Disinfectant:—Sprinkle fresh ground coffee on a shovel of hot coals, or burn sugar on hot coals. Vinegar boiled with myrrh, sprinkled on the floor and furniture of a sick room, is an excellent deodorizer.

To Prevent Mold:—A small quantity of carbolic acid added to paste, mucilage and ink, will prevent mold. An ounce of the acid to a gallon of whitewash will keep cellars and dairies from the disagreeable odor which often taints milk and meat kept in such places.

To Make Tracing-Paper:—Dissolve a ball of white beeswax, one inch in diameter, in half a pint of turpentine. Saturate the paper in this bath and let it dry two or three days before using.

To Preserve Brooms:—Dip them for a minute or two in a kettle of boiling suds once a week and they will last much longer, making them tough and pliable. A carpet wears much longer swept with a broom cared for in this manner.

To Clean Brass-Ware, etc.:—Mix one ounce of oxalic acid, six ounces of rotten stone, all in powder, one ounce of sweet oil, and sufficient water to make a paste. Apply a small portion, and rub dry with a flannel or leather. The liquid dip most generally used consists of nitric and sulphuric acids; but this is more corrosive.

Polish or Enamel for Shirt Bosoms is made by melting together one ounce of white wax, and two ounces of spermaceti; heat gently and turn into a very shallow pan; when cold cut or break in pieces. When making boiled starch the usual way, enough for a dozen bosoms, add to it a piece of the polish the size of a hazel nut.

An Erasive Fluid for the Removal of Spots on Furniture, and all kinds of fabrics, without injuring the color, is made of four ounces of aqua ammonia, one ounce of glycerine, one ounce of castile soap and one of spirits of wine. Dissolve the soap in two quarts of soft water, add the other ingredients. Apply with a soft sponge and rub out. Very good for deaning silks.

To Remove the Odor of Onion from fish-kettle and saucepans in which they have been cooked, put wood-ashes or sal soda, potash or lye; fill with water and let it stand on the stove until it boils; then wash in hot suds, and rinse well.

To Clean Marble Busts:—First free them from all dust, then wash them with very weak hydrochloric acid. Soap injures the color of marble.

To Remove old Putty from Window Frames, pass a red hot poker slowly over it and it will come off easily.

Hanging Pictures:—The most safe material and also the best, is copper wire, of the size proportioned to the weight of the picture. When hung the wire is scarcely visible, and its strength is far superior to cord.

To Keep Milk Sweet:—Put into a panful a spoonful of grated horse-radish, it will keep it sweet for days.

To Take Rust from Steel Implements or Knives:—Rub them well with kerosene oil, leaving them covered with it a day or so; then rub them hard and well with finely powdered unslaked lime.

Poison Water:—Water boiled in galvanized iron becomes poisonous, and cold water passed through zinc-lined iron pipes should never be used for cooking or drinking. Hot water for cooking should never be taken from hot water pipes; keep a supply heated in kettles.

Scouring Soap for Cotton and Silk Goods:—Mix one pound of common soap, half a pound of beef-gall and one ounce and a half of Venetian turpentine.

A Paint for Wood or Stone that Resists all Moisture:—Melt twelve ounces of resin; mix with it, thoroughly, six gallons of fish oil and one pound of melted sulphur. Rub up some ochre or any other coloring substance with a little linseed oil, enough to give it the right, color and thickness. Apply several coats of the hot composition with a brush. The first coat should be very thin.

To Ventilate a Room:—Place a pitcher of cold water on a table in your room and it will absorb all the gases with which the room is filled from the respiration of those eating or sleeping in the apartment. Very few realize how important such purification is for the health of the family, or, indeed, understand or realize that there can be any impurity in the rooms; yet in a few hours a pitcher or pail of cold water—the colder the more effective—will make the air of a room pure, but the water will be entirely unfit for use.

To Fill Cracks in Plaster:—Use vinegar instead of water to mix your plaster of Paris. The resultant mass will be like putty, and will not "set" for twenty or thirty minutes; whereas, if you use water the plaster will become hard almost immediately, before you have time to use it. Push it into the cracks and smooth it off nicely with a table knife.

To Take Spots from Wash Goods:—Rub them with the yolk of egg before washing.

To Take White Spots from Varnished Furniture:—Hold a hot stove lid or plate over them and they will soon disappear.

To Prevent Oil from Becoming Rancid:—Drop a few drops of ether into the bottle containing it.

Troublesome Ants:—A heavy chalk mark laid a finger's distance from your sugar box and all around (there must be no space not covered) will surely prevent ants from troubling.

To Make Tough Meat Tender:—Lay it a few minutes in a strong vinegar water.

To Remove Discoloration from Bruises:—Apply a cloth wrung out in very hot water, and renew frequently until the pain ceases. Or apply raw beefsteak.

A Good Polish for Removing Stains, Spots and Mildew from Furniture is made as follows: Take half a pint of ninety-eight per cent, alcohol, a quarter of an ounce each of pulverized resin and gum shellac, add half a pint of linseed oil; shake well and apply with a brush or sponge.

To Remove Finger-Marks:—Sweet oil will remove finger-marks from varnished furniture, and kerosene from oiled furniture.

To Remove Paint from Black Silk:—Patient rubbing with chloroform will remove paint from black silk or any other goods, and will not hurt the most delicate color or fabric.

To Freshen Gilt Frames:—Gilt frames may be revived by carefully dusting them, and then washing with one ounce of soda beaten up with the whites of three eggs. Scraped patches might be touched tip with any gold paint. Castile soap and water, with proper care, may be used to clean oil paintings; other methods should not be employed without some skill.

To Destroy Moths in Furniture:—All the baking and steaming are useless, as, although the moths may be killed, their eggs are sure to hatch, and the upholstery to be well riddled. The naphtha-bath process is effectual. A sofa, chair or lounge may be immersed in the large vats used for the purpose, and all insect life will be absolutely destroyed. No egg ever hatches after passing through the naphtha-bath; all oil, dirt or grease disappears, and not the slightest damage is done to the most costly article. Sponging with naphtha will not answer. It is the immersion for two hours or more in the specially prepared vats which is effectual.

Slicing Pineapples:—The knife used for peeling a pineapple should not be used for slicing it, as the rind contains an acid that is apt to cause a swollen mouth and sore lips. The Cubans use salt as an antidote for the ill effects of the peel.

To Clean Iron Sinks:—Rub them well with a cloth wet with kerosene oil.

To Erase Discoloration on Stone China:—Dishes and cups that are used for baking custards, puddings, etc., that require scouring, may be easily cleaned by rubbing with a damp cloth dipped in whiting or "Sapolio," then washed as usual.

To Remove Ink, Wine or Fruit Stains:—Saturate well in tomato juice; it is also an excellent thing to remove stains from the hands.

To Set Colors in Washable Goods:—Soak them previous to washing in a water in which is allowed a tablespoonful of ox-gall to a gallon of water.

To Take out Paint:—Equal parts of ammonia and turpentine will take paint out of clothing, no matter how dry or hard it may be. Saturate the spot two or three times, then wash out in soap-suds. Ten cents' worth of oxalic acid dissolved in a pint of hot water will remove paint spots from the windows. Pour a little into a cup, and apply to the spots with a swab, but be sure not to allow the acid to touch the hands. Brasses may be quickly cleaned with it. Great care must be exercised in labeling the bottle, and putting it out of the reach of children, as it is a deadly poison.

To Remove Tar from Cloth:—Saturate the spot and rub it well with turpentine, and every trace of tar will be removed.

To Destroy Ants:—Ants that frequent houses or gardens may be destroyed by taking flour of brimstone half a pound, and potash four ounces; set them in an iron or earthen pan over the fire until dissolved and united; afterwards beat them to a powder, and infuse a little of this powder in water, and wherever you sprinkle it the ants will fly the place.

Simple Disinfectant:—The following is a refreshing disinfectant for a sick room, or any room that has an unpleasant aroma prevading it: Put some fresh ground coffee in a saucer, and in the centre place a small piece of camphor gum, which light with a match. As the gum burns, allow sufficient coffee to consume with it. The perfume is very pleasant and healthful, being far superior to pastiles, and very much cheaper.

Cure for Hiccough:—Sit erect and inflate the lungs fully. Then, retaining the breath, bend forward slowly until the chest meets the knees. After slowly arising again to the erect position, slowly exhale the breath. Repeat this process a second time, and the nerves will be found to have received an access of energy that will enable them to perform their natural functions.

To Keep out Mosquitoes and Bats:—If a bottle of the oil of pennyroyal is left uncorked in a room at night, not a mosquito, nor any other blood-sucker, will be found there in the morning. Mix potash with powdered meal, and throw it into the rat-holes of a cellar, and the rats will depart. If a rat or a mouse get into your pantry, stuff into its hole a rag saturated with a solution of cayenne pepper, and no rat or mouse will touch the rag for the purpose of opening communication with a depot of supplies.

Salt will Curdle New Milk; hence, in preparing porridge, gravies, etc., the salt should not be added until the dish is prepared.

To Prevent Rust on Flat-Irons:—Beeswax and salt will make your rusty flat-irons as smooth and clean as glass. Tie a lump of wax in a rag and keep it for that purpose. When the irons are hot, rub them first with the wax rag, then scour with a paper or cloth sprinkled with salt.

To Prevent Rust on Knives:—Steel knives which are not in general use may be kept from rusting if they are dipped in a strong solution of soda: one part water to four of soda; then wipe dry, roll in flannel and keep in a dry place.

Flowers May be Kept Very Fresh over Night if they are excluded from the air. To do this, wet them thoroughly, put in a damp box, and cover with wet raw cotton or wet newspaper, then place in a cool spot.

To Sweeten Milk:—Milk which is slightly turned or changed may be sweetened and rendered fit for use again by stirring in a little soda.

To Scour Knives Easily:—Mix a small quantity of baking soda with your brick-dust and see if your knives do not polish better.

To Soften Boots and Shoes:—Kerosene will soften boots and shoes which have been hardened by water, and render them as pliable as new. Kerosine will make tin kettles as bright as new. Saturate a woolen rag and rub with it. It will also remove stains from clean varnished furniture.

Faded Goods:—Plush goods and all articles dyed with aniline colors, which have faded from exposure to the light, will look as bright as new after sponging with chloroform.

Choking:—A piece of food lodged in the throat may sometimes be pushed down with the finger, or removed with a hair-pin quickly straightened and hooked at the end, or by two or three vigorous blows on the back between the shoulders.

To Prevent Mold on the Top of Glasses of Jelly, lay a lump of paraffine on the top of the hot jelly, letting it melt and spread over it. No brandy paper and no other covering is necessary. If preferred the paraffine can be melted and poured over after the jelly is cold.

To Preserve Ribbons and Silks:—Ribbons and silks should be put away for preservation in brown paper; the chloride of lime in white paper discolors them. A white satin dress should be pinned up in blue paper with brown paper outside sewn together at the edges.

To Preserve Bouquets:—Put a little saltpetre in the water you use for your bouquets and the flowers will live for a fortnight.

To Destroy Cockroaches:—Hellebore sprinkled on the floor at night. They eat it and are poisoned.

To Remove Iron Rust:—Lemon juice and salt will remove ordinary iron rust. If the hands are stained there is nothing that will remove the stains as well as lemon. Cut a lemon in halves and apply the cut surface as if it were soap.

To Keep Bar Soap:—Cut it into pieces and put it into a dry place; it is more economical to use after it has become hard, as it does not waste so readily.

To Brighten Carpets:—Carpets after the dust has been beaten out may be brightened by scattering upon them corn meal mixed with salt and then sweeping it off. Mix salt and meal in equal proportions. Carpets should be thoroughly beaten on the wrong side first and then on the right side, after which spots may be removed by the use of ox-gall or ammonia and water.

Silver Tea and Coffeepot:—When putting away those not in use every day lay a little stick across the top under the cover. This will allow fresh air to get in and prevent the mustiness of the contents, familiar to hotel and boarding-house sufferers.

To Prevent Creaking of Bedsteads:—If a bedstead creaks at each movement of the sleeper, remove the slats, and wrap the ends of each in old newspapers.

To Clean Unvarnished Black Walnut:—Milk, sour or sweet, well rubbed in with an old soft flannel, will make black walnut look new.

To Prevent Cracking of Bottles and Fruit Jars:—If a bottle or fruit-jar that has been more than once used is placed on a towel thoroughly soaked in hot water, there is little danger of its being cracked by the introduction of a hot liquid.

To Prevent Lamp-wicks from Smoking:—Soak them in vinegar and then dry them thoroughly.

Rub the nickel stove-trimmings and the plated handles and hinges of doors with kerosene and whiting, and polish with a dry cloth.

Death to Bugs:—Varnish is death to the most persistent bug. It is cheap—ten cents' worth will do for one bedstead—is easily used, is safe, and improves the looks of the furniture to which it is applied. The application, must, however, be thorough, the slats, sides, and every crack and corner receiving attention.

That salt should be eaten with nuts to aid digestion.

That milk which stands too long makes bitter butter.

To Clean Drain Pipes:—Drain pipes, and all places that are sour or impure, may be cleaned with lime-water or carbolic acid.

If oil-cloth be occasionally rubbed with a mixture of beeswax and turpentine, it will last longer.

To Remove Mildew from Cloth:—Put a teaspoonful of chloride of lime into a quart of water, strain it twice, then dip the mildewed places in this weak solution; lay in the sun; if the mildew has not disappeared when dry, repeat the operation. Also soaking the article in sour milk and salt; then lay in the sun; repeat until all the mildew is out.

To Take Ink out of Linen:—Dip the ink spot in pure melted tallow, then wash out the tallow and the ink will come out with it. This is said to be unfailing. Milk will remove ink from linen or colored muslins, when acids would be ruinous, by soaking the goods until the spot is very faint and then rubbing and rinsing in cold water.

Ink spots on floors can be extracted by scouring with sand wet in oil of vitriol and water. When ink is removed, rinse with strong pearl-ash water.

To Toughen Lamp Chimneys and Glass-ware:—Immerse the article in a pot filled with cold water, to which some common salt has been added. Boil the water well, then cool slowly. Glass treated in this way will resist any sudden change of temperature.

To Remove Paint from Window-glass:—Rub it well with hot sharp vinegar.

To Clean Stove-pipe:—A piece of zinc put on the live coals in the stove will clean out the stove-pipe.

Packing Bottles:—India-rubber bands slipped over them will prevent breakage.

To Clean Ivory Ornaments:—When ivory ornaments become yellow or dusky, wash them well in soap and water with a small brush, to clean the carvings, and then place them, while wet, in the sunshine. Wet them with soapy water for two or three days, several times a day, still keeping them in the sunshine, then wash them again, and they will be perfectly white.

Stained Brass:—Whiting wet with aqua ammonia, will cleanse brass from stains, and is excellent for polishing faucets and door-knobs of brass or silver. "Sapolio" is still better.

Hartshorn applied to the stings of poisonous insects will allay the pain and stop the swelling; or apply oil of sassafras, which is better. Bee stings should be treated in this way.

For Cleaning Glass Bottles:—Crush egg-shells into small bits, or a few carpet tacks, or a small quantity of gunshot, put into the bottle; then fill one-half full of strong soap-suds; shake thoroughly, then rinse in clear water. Will look like new.

Cutting off Glass Bottles for Clips and Jars:—A simple, practical way is to take a red-hot poker with a pointed end; make a mark with a file to begin the cut; then apply the hot iron and a crack will start, which will follow the iron wherever it is carried. This is, on the whole, simple, and better than the use of strings wet with turpentine, etc.

Cistern Water may be Purified by charcoal put in a bag and hung in the water.

Salt will Remove the Stain from Silver caused by eggs, when applied dry with a soft cloth.

Opened Fruit, Fish or Vegetables:—Never allow opened fruit, fish or vegetables to stand in the tin can. Never stir anything in tin, or, if it is done, use a wooden spoon. In lifting pies or cakes from bright tin pans, use great caution that the knife does not scrape off flecks of bright metal.

Never use water which has stood in a lead pipe over night. Not less than a wooden bucketful should be allowed to run.

Never use water from a stone reservoir for cooking purposes.

Never allow fresh meat to remain in paper; it absorbs the juices.

Never keep vinegar or yeast in stone crocks or jugs; their acid attacks the glazing, which is said to be poisonous. Glass for either is better.

Squeaking Doors ought to have the hinges oiled by putting on a drop from the sewing machine oil-can.

Plate Glass and Mirrors:—A soft cloth wet in alcohol, is excellent to wipe off plate glass and mirrors, and prevents their becoming frosty in winter.

A red-hot iron will soften old putty so that it can be easily removed.

To Test Nutmegs:—Prick them with a pin; if good, the oil will instantly spread around the puncture.

A Good Way to Clean Mica in a stove that has become blackened with smoke, is to take it out, and thoroughly wash it with vinegar. If the black does not come off at once, let it soak a little.

To Banish Rats from the Premises, use pounded glass mixed with dry corn meal, placed within their reach. Sprinkling cayenne pepper in their holes will also banish them. Chloride of lime is an infallible remedy, spread around where they come, and thrown into their holes; it should be renewed once in two weeks. Tar is also a good remedy.

To Prevent the Odor of Boiling Ham or Cabbage:—Throw red pepper pods or a few bits of charcoal into the pan they are cooking in.

To Brighten Gilt Frames:—Take sufficient flour of sulphur to give a golden tinge to about one and one-half pints of water, and in this boil four or five bruised onions, or garlic, which will answer the same purpose. Strain off the liquid, and with it, when cold, wash with a soft brush any gilding which requires restoring, and when dry, it will come out as bright as new work.

All cooking utensils, including iron-ware, should be washed outside and inside in hot, soapy water; rinsed in clean, hot water, wiped dry with a dry towel; a soapy or greasy dish-cloth should never be used for the purpose.

A cake of sapolio should be kept in every kitchen, to be used freely on all dishes that require scouring and cleansing. All tins that have become discolored can be made as bright and clean as new by the use of sapolio; also shines dishes; and, in fact, almost all articles that require any scouring. Purchased at all groceries. One of the most useful articles ever used in the kitchen.

TOILET RECIPES, ITEMS.

COLOGNE WATER. (Superior.)

Oil of lavender two drachms, oil of rosemary one drachm and a half, orange, lemon and bergamot, one drachm each of the oil; also two drachms of the essence of musk, attar of rose ten drops, and a pint of proof spirit. Shake all together thoroughly three times a day for a week.

JOCKEY CLUB BOUQUET.

Mix one pint extract of rose, one pint extract of tuberose, half a pint of extract of cassia, four ounces extract of jasmine, and three ounces tincture of civet. Filter the mixture.

ROSE-WATER.

Preferable to the distilled for a perfume, or for culinary purposes. Attar of rose, twelve drops; rub it up with half an ounce of white sugar and two drachms carbonate magnesia; then add gradually one quart of water and two ounces of proof spirit, and filter through paper.

BAY RUM.

French proof spirit one gallon, extract bay six ounces. Mix and color with caramel; needs no filtering.

LAVENDER WATER.

Oil of lavender two ounces, orris root half an ounce, spirits of wine one pint. Mix and keep two or three weeks. It may then be strained through two thicknesses of blotting-paper and is ready for use.

CREAM OF LILIES.

Best white castor oil; pour in a little strong solution of sal tartar in water, and shake it until it looks thick and white. Perfume with lavender.

CREAM OF ROSES.

Olive oil one pound, attar of roses fifty drops, oil of rosemary twenty-five drops; mix, and color it with alkanet root.

COLD CREAM.

Melt one ounce oil of almonds, half ounce spermaceti, one drachm white wax, and then add two ounces of rose-water, and stir it constantly until cold.

LIP-SALVE.

Melt one ounce white wax, one ounce sweet oil, one drachm spermaceti, and throw in a piece of alkanet root to color it, and when cooling, perfume it with oil rose, and then pour it into small white jars or boxes.

FOR DANDRUFF.

Take glycerine four ounces, tincture of cantharides five ounces, bay rum four ounces, water two ounces. Mix, and apply once a day and rub well down the scalp.

HAIR INVIGORATOR.

Bay rum two pints, alcohol one pint, castor oil one ounce, carb. ammonia half an ounce, tincture of cantharides one ounce. Mix them well. This compound will promote the growth of the hair and prevent it from falling out.

MACASSAR OIL FOR THE HAIR.

Renowned for the past fifty years, is as follows: Take a quarter of an ounce of the chippings of alkanet root, tie this in a bit of coarse muslin and put it in a bottle containing eight ounces of sweet oil; cover it to keep out the dust; let it stand several days; add to this sixty drops of tincture of cantharides, ten drops of oil of rose, neroli and lemon each sixty drops; let it stand one week and you will have one of the most powerful stimulants for the growth of the hair ever known.

Another:—To a pint of strong sage tea, a pint of bay rum and a quarter of an ounce of the tincture of cantharides, add an ounce of castor oil and a teaspoonful of rose, or other perfume. Shake well before applying to the hair, as the oil will not mix.

PHALON'S INSTANTANEOUS HAIR DYE.

To one ounce of crystallized nitrate of silver, dissolved in one ounce of concentrated aqua ammonia, add one ounce of gum arabic and six ounces of soft water. Keep in the dark. Remember to remove all grease from the hair before applying the dye.

There is danger in some of the patent hair dyes, and hence the Scientific American offers what is known as the walnut hair dye. The simplest form is the expressed juice of the bark or shell of green walnuts. To preserve the juice a little alcohol is commonly added to it with a few bruised cloves, and the whole digested together, with occasional agitation, for a week or fortnight, when the clear portion is decanted, and, if necessary, filtered. Sometimes a little common salt is added with the same intention. It should be kept in a cool place. The most convenient way of application is by means of a sponge.

DYE FOR WHITE OR LIGHT EYEBROWS.

Boil an ounce of walnut bark in a pint of water for an hour. Add a lump of alum the size of a filbert, and when cold, apply with a camel's-hair brush.

HAIR WASH.

One penny's worth of borax, half a pint of olive oil, one pint of boiling water.

Pour the boiling water over the borax and oil; let it cool; then put the mixture into a bottle. Shake it before using, and apply it with a flannel. Camphor and borax, dissolved in boiling water and left to cool, make a very good wash for the hair; as also does rosemary water mixed with a little borax. After using any of these washes, when the hair becomes thoroughly dry, a little pomatum or oil should be rubbed in to make it smooth and glossy—that is, if one prefers oil on the hair.

OXMARROW-POMADE FOR THE HAIR.

One marrow bone, half a pint of oil, ten cents' worth of citronella. Take the marrow out of the bone, place it in warm water, let it get almost to boiling point, then let it cool and pour the water away; repeat this three times until the marrow is thoroughly "fined." Beat the marrow to a cream with a silver fork, stir the oil in, drop by drop, beating all the time; when quite cold add the citronella, pour into jars and cover down.

TO INCREASE THE HAIR IN THE BROWS.

Clip them and anoint with a, little sweet oil. Should the hair fall out, having been full, use one of the hair invigorators.

BANDOLINE.

To one quart of rose-water add an ounce and a half of gum tragacanth; let it stand forty-eight hours, frequently straining it, then strain through a coarse linen cloth; let it stand two days, and again strain; add to it a drachm of oil of roses. Used by ladies dressing their hair, to make it lie in any position.

COMPLEXION WASH.

Put in a vial one drachm of benzoin gum in powder, one drachm nutmeg oil, six drops of orange-blossom tea, or apple blossoms put in half pint of rain-water and boiled down to one teaspoonful and strained, one pint of sherry wine. Bathe the face morning and night; will remove all flesh-worms and freckles, and give a beautiful complexion. Or, put one ounce of powdered gum of benzoin in a pint of whisky; to use, put in water in wash-bowl till it is milky, allowing it to dry without wiping. This is perfectly harmless.

Cream cures sun-burn on some complexions, lemon juice is best on others, and cold water suits still others best.

BURNET'S CELEBRATED POWDER FOR THE FACE.

Five cents' worth of bay rum, five cents' worth of magnesia snowflake, five cents' worth of bergamot, five cents' worth of oil of lemon; mix in a pint bottle and fill up with rain-water. Shake well, and apply with a soft sponge or cloth.

TOILET OR FACE POWDER.

Take a quarter of a pound of wheat starch pounded fine; sift it through a fine sieve, or a piece of lace; add to it eight drops of oil of rose, oil of lemon thirty drops, oil of bergamot fifteen drops. Rub thoroughly together.

The French throw this powder into alcohol, shaking it, letting it settle, then pouring off the alcohol and drying the powder. In that case, the perfume is added lastly.

TO REMOVE FRECKLES.

The following lotion is highly recommended: One ounce of lemon juice, a quarter of a drachm of powdered borax, and half a drachm of sugar; mix in a bottle, and allow them to stand a few days, when the liquor should be rubbed occasionally on the hands and face. Another application is: Friar's balsam one part, rose-water twenty parts.

Powdered nitre moistened with water and applied to the face night and morning, is said to remove freckles without injury to the skin.

Also, a tablespoonful of freshly grated horse-radish, stirred into a cupful of sour milk; let it stand for twelve hours, then strain and apply often. This bleaches the complexion also, and takes off tan.

TO REMOVE MOTH PATCHES.

Into a pint of rum put a tablespoonful of flour of sulphur. Apply this to the patches once a day, and they will disappear in two or three weeks.

CURE FOR PIMPLES.

One teaspoonful of carbolic acid and one pint of rose-water mixed is an excellent remedy for pimples. Bathe the skin thoroughly and often, but do not let the wash get into the eyes.

This wash is soothing to mosquito bites, and irritations of the skin of every nature.

It is advisable, in order to clear the complexion permanently, to cleanse the blood; then the wash would be of advantage.

To obtain a good complexion, a person's diet should receive the first attention. Greasy food, highly spiced soups, hot bread and butter, meats or game, rich gravies, alcoholic liquors, coffee—all are injurious to the complexion. Strong tea used daily will after a time give the skin the color and appearance of leather. Coffee affects the nerves more, but the skin less, and a healthy nervous system is necessary to beauty. Eating between meals, late suppers, over-eating at meals, eating sweetmeats, candies, etc., all these tend to disorder the blood, producing pimples and blotches.

Washing of the face or skin is another consideration for a good complexion; it should be thoroughly washed in plenty of luke-warm water with some mild soap—then rinsed in clear water well; dry with a thick soft towel. If suds is left or wiped off the skin, the action of the air and sun will tan the surface, and permanently deface the complexion; therefore one should be sure to thoroughly rinse off all soap from the skin to avoid the tanning, which will leave a brown or yellow tinge impossible to efface.

PEARL SMELLING SALTS.

Powdered carbonate of ammonia one ounce, strong solution of ammonia half a fluid ounce, oil of rosemary ten drops, oil of bergamot ten drops. Mix, and while moist put in wide-mouthed bottle which is to be well closed.

PEARL TOOTH POWDER.

Prepared chalk half a pound, powdered myrrh two ounces; camphor two drachms, orris root, powdered, two ounces; moisten the camphor with alcohol and mix well together.

REMOVING TARTAR FROM THE TEETH.

This preparation is used by dentists. Pure muriatic acid one ounce, water one ounce, honey two ounces, mix thoroughly. Take a tooth-brush, and wet it freely with this preparation, and briskly rub the black teeth, and in a moment's time they will be perfectly white; then immediately wash out the mouth well with water, that the acid may not act on the enamel of the teeth. This should be done only occasionally.

BAD BREATH.

Bad breath from catarrh, foul stomach, or bad teeth, may be temporarily relieved by diluting a little bromo chloralum with eight or ten parts of water, and using it as a gargle, and swallowing a few drops before going out. A pint of bromo chloralum costs fifty cents, but a small vial will last a long time.

SHAVING COMPOUND.

Half a pound of plain, white soap, dissolved in a small quantity of alcohol, as little as can be used; add a tablespoonful of pulverized borax. Shave the soap and put it in a small tin basin or cup; place it on the fire in a dish of boiling water; when melted, add the alcohol, and remove from the fire; stir in oil of bergamot sufficient to perfume it.

BARBER'S SHAMPOO MIXTURE.

Dissolve half an ounce of carbonate of ammonia and one ounce of borax in one quart of water; then add two ounces of glycerine in three quarts of New England rum, and one quart of bay rum. Moisten the hair with this liquid; shampoo with the hands until a light lather is formed; then wash off with plenty of clean water.

RAZOR-STROP PASTE.

Wet the strop with a little sweet oil, and apply a little flour of emery evenly over the surface.

CAMPHOR ICE.

Melt together over a water bath white wax and spermaceti each one ounce, camphor two ounces, sweet almond oil, one pound, then triturate until the mixture has become homogeneous, and allow one pound of rose-water to flow in slowly during the operation. Excellent for chapped lips or hands.

ODORIFEROUS OR SWEET-SCENTING BAGS.

Lavender flowers one ounce, pulverized orris, two drachms, bruised rosemary leaves half ounce, musk five grains, attar of rose five drops. Mix well, sew up in small flat muslin bags, and cover them with fancy silk or satin.

These are very nice to keep in your bureau drawers or trunk, as the perfume penetrates through the contents of the trunk or drawers. An acceptable present to a single gentleman.

HOW TO KEEP BRUSHES CLEAN.

The best way in which to clean hair-brushes is with spirits of ammonia, as its effect is immediate. No rubbing is required, and cold water can be used just as successfully as warm. Take a tablespoonful of ammonia to a quart of water, dip the hair part of the brush without wetting the ivory, and in a moment the grease is removed; then rinse in cold water, shake well, and dry in the air, but not in the sun. Soda and soap soften the bristles and invariably turn the ivory yellow.

TOILET ITEMS.

Mutton tallow is considered excellent to soften the hands. It may be rubbed on at any time when the hands are perfectly dry, but the best time is when retiring, and an old pair of soft, large gloves thoroughly covered on the inside with the tallow and glycerine in equal parts, melted together, can be worn during the night with the most satisfactory results.

Four parts of glycerine and five parts of yolks of eggs thoroughly mixed, and applied after washing the hands, is also considered excellent.

For chapped hands or face: One ounce of glycerine, one ounce of alcohol mixed, then add eight ounces of rose-water.

Another good rule is to rub well in dry oatmeal after every washing, and be particular regarding the quality of soap. Cheap soap and hard water are the unknown enemies of many people, and the cause of rough skin and chapped hands. Castile soap and rain-water will sometimes cure without any other assistance.

Camphor ice is also excellent, and can be applied with but little inconvenience. Borax dissolved and added to the toilet water is also good.

For chapped lips, beeswax dissolved in a small quantity of sweet oil, by heating carefully. Apply the salve two or three times a day, and avoid wetting the lips as much as possible.

To soften the hands: One can have the hands in soap-suds with soft soap without injury to the skin if the hands are dipped in vinegar or lemon juice immediately after. The acids destroy the corrosive effects of the alkali, and make the hands soft and white. Indian meal and vinegar or lemon juice used on hands where roughened by cold or labor will heal and soften them. Rub the hands in this, then wash off thoroughly and rub in glycerine. Those who suffer from chapped hands will find this comforting.

To remove stains, rub a slice of raw potato upon the stains; or wash the hands in lemon juice or steeped laurel-leaves.

To give a fine color to the nails, the hands and fingers must be well lathered and washed with fine soap; then the nails must be rubbed with equal parts of cinnebar and emery, followed by oil of bitter almonds. To take white spots from the nails, melt equal parts of pitch and turpentine in a small cup; add to it vinegar and powdered sulphur. Rub this on the nails and the spots will soon disappear.

TOILET SOAP.

One pound of washing soda, one pound of lard or clear tallow, half a pound of unslaked lime, one tablespoonful of salt, three quarts of water. Put the soda and lime in a large dish, and pour over the water, boiling hot; stir until dissolved; let it stand until clear, then pour off the clear liquid, add the grease and salt; boil four hours, then pour into pans to cool. If it should be inclined to curdle or separate, indicating the lime to be too strong, pour in a little more water, and boil again. Perfume as you please, and pour into molds or a shallow dish, and, when cold, cut into bars to dry.

ANTIDOTES FOR POISONS.

The following list gives some of the more common poisons and the remedies most likely to be on hand in case of need:—

Acids:—These cause great heat and sensation of burning pain from the mouth down to the stomach. The remedies are-: Magnesia, soda, pearl ash, or soap dissolved in water, every two minutes; then use the stomach pump, or an emetic.

Alkali:—Drink freely of water with vinegar or lemon juice in it, made very strong of the sour.

Ammonia:—Remedy is lemon juice or vinegar.

Arsenic Remedies:—Give prompt emetic of mustard and salt, a tablespoonful of each, in a coffeecup of warm water; then follow with sweet oil, butter made warm, or milk. Also may use the white of an egg in half a cupful of milk or lime water. Chalk and water is good, and the preparation of iron, ten drops in water every half hour: hydrated magnesia.

Alcohol:—First cleanse out the stomach by an emetic, then dash cold water on the head, and give ammonia (spirits of hartshorn).

Laudanum, Morphine, Opium:—First give a strong emetic of mustard and water, then very strong coffee and acid drinks; dash cold water on the head, then keep in motion.

Belladonna:—Give an emetic of mustard, salt and water; then drink plenty of vinegar and water or lemonade.

Charcoal:—In poisons, by carbonic gas, remove the patient to the open air, dash cold water on the head and body, and stimulate the nostrils and lungs with hartshorn, at the same time rubbing the chest briskly.

Corrosive Sublimate, Saltpetre, Blue Vitriol, Bed-bug Poison:—Give white of egg, freshly mixed with water, in large quantities; or give wheat flour and water, or soap and water freely, or salt and water, or large draughts of milk.

Lead:—White lead and sugar of lead. Give an emetic, then follow with cathartics, such as castor oil, and epsom salts especially.

Nux Vomica:—First emetics, and then brandy.

Oxalic Acid (frequently taken for epsom salts):—First give soap and water, or chalk or magnesia and water. Give every two minutes.

White Vitriol:—Give plenty of milk and water.

Tartar Emetic:—Take large doses of tea made of white oak bark, or peruvian bark. Drink plenty of warm water to encourage vomiting; then, if the vomiting should not stop, give a grain of opium in water.

Nitrate of Silver (lunar caustic):—Give a strong solution of common salt and water, and then an emetic.

Verdigris:—Give plenty of white of egg and water.

Tobacco:—Emetics, frequent draughts of cold water; camphor and brandy.

MAY.

JUNE.

JULY.

AUGUST.

SEPTEMBER.

OCTOBER.

NOVEMBER.

DECEMBER.

SPECIAL MENUS.

MANAGEMENT AND DIRECTIONOFDINNERS AND RECEPTIONSONSTATE OCCASIONS AT THE WHITE HOUSE.