Soft Soap.
It is best to make the soap a few weeks before you wish to use it, as it is rather hard on the hands when new. Here is a good rule for making the soap without heating the grease:—
Put fourteen pounds of crude—not concentrated—potash in a wooden pail and pour over it enough boiling water to cover it. Stir well, and let the mixture stand over night. In the morning pour this mixture into a large kettle and place on the fire. Now add another pail of boiling water, and stir frequently with a stick until all the potash is dissolved. Next put ten quarts of soap grease in a water-tight barrel and gradually pour in the hot potash. Stir until all the grease is united with the potash. Let this stand for three hours; then add a pailful of hot water and stir well. Add another pailful three hours later. After this add a pailful each day for the next six days, stirring well with a long stick each time. The soap should be stirred every day for the next three weeks, when it will be ready for use.
Be sure the potash is pure.
CHAPTER VI.
IN THE DINING-ROOM.
ONE’S dining-room should be large enough to enable a person to pass around the table comfortably when the family or guests are all seated. It should also be light and sunny, and easily heated and ventilated. The most essential pieces of furniture are a table of generous width, capable of being enlarged, comfortable chairs, and a sideboard. After that, if the room be large enough and the purse will admit of the purchase of a cabinet or two, with glass fronts and sides, so much the better. In these there can be kept dainty bits of china and glassware. These cabinets will brighten a dining-room more than anything else you can put into it, possibly excepting pictures. If there be no room for a cabinet, a corner cupboard and some hanging shelves will be a great addition. Pictures that suggest pleasant things are, of course, always desirable. A few thrifty ferns, flowering plants, or evergreens add a great deal to the brightness and beauty of any room, but particularly the dining-room. Have them there if you possibly can.