Cheap footstools, made of a square plank, covered with tow-cloth, stuffed, and then covered with carpeting, with worsted handles, look very well. Sweep carpets as seldom as possible, as it wears them out. To shake them often, is good economy. In cleaning carpets, use damp tea leaves, or wet Indian meal, throwing it about, and rubbing it over with the broom. The latter, is very good for cleansing carpets made dingy by coal-dust. In brushing carpets in ordinary use, it will be found very convenient to use a large flat dust-pan, with a perpendicular handle a yard high, put on so that the pan will stand alone. This can be carried about, and used without stooping, brushing dust into it with a common broom. The pan must be very large, or it will be upset.
When carpets are taken up, they should be hung on a line, or laid on long grass, and whipped, first on one side, and then on the other, with pliant whips. If laid aside, they should be sewed up tight, in linen, having snuff or tobacco put along all the crevices where moths could enter. Shaking pepper, from a pepper-box, round the edge of the floor, under a carpet, prevents the access of moths.
Carpets can be best washed on the floor, thus: First shake them; and then, after cleaning the floor, stretch and nail them upon it. Then scrub them in cold soapsuds, having half a teacupful of ox-gall to a bucket of water. Then wash off the suds, with a cloth, in fair water. Set open the doors and windows, for two days or more. Imperial Brussels, Venetian, ingrain, and three-ply, carpets, can be washed thus; but Wilton, and other plush-carpets, cannot. Before washing them, take out grease, with a paste, made of potter's clay, ox-gall, and water.
Straw matting is best for chambers and Summer parlors. The checked, of two colors, is not so good to wear. The best, is the cheapest in the end. When washed, it should be done with salt water, wiping it dry; but frequent washing injures it. Bind matting with cotton binding. Sew breadths together like carpeting. In joining the ends of pieces, ravel out a part, and tie the threads together, turning under a little of each piece, and then, laying the ends close, nail them down, with nails having kid under their heads.
In hanging pictures, put them so that the lower part shall be opposite the eye. Cleanse the glass of pictures with whiting, as water endangers the pictures. Gilt frames can be much better preserved by putting on a coat of copal varnish, which, with proper brushes, can be bought of carriage or cabinet-makers. When dry, it can be washed with fair water. Wash the brush in spirits of turpentine.
Curtains, ottomans, and sofas covered with worsted, can be cleansed, by wheat-bran, rubbed on with flannel. Dust Venetian blinds with feather brushes. Buy light-colored ones, as the green are going out of fashion. Strips of linen or cotton, on rollers and pulleys, are much in use, to shut out the sun from curtains and carpets. Paper curtains, pasted on old cotton, are good for chambers. Put them on rollers, having cords nailed to them, so that when the curtain falls, the cord will be wound up. Then, by pulling the cord, the curtain will be rolled up.
Mahogany furniture should be made in the Spring, and stand some months before it is used, or it will shrink and warp. Varnished furniture should be rubbed only with silk, except occasionally, when a little sweet-oil should be rubbed over, and wiped off carefully. For unvarnished furniture, use beeswax, a little softened with sweet-oil; rub it in with a hard brush, and polish with woollen and silk rags. Some persons rub in linseed-oil; others mix beeswax with a little spirits of turpentine and rosin, making it so that it can be put on with a sponge, and wiped off with a soft rag. Others, keep in a bottle the following mixture; two ounces of spirits of turpentine, four tablespoonfuls of sweet-oil, and one quart of milk. This is applied with a sponge, and wiped off with a linen rag.
Hearths and jambs, of brick, look best painted over with blacklead, mixed with soft-soap. Wash the bricks which are nearest the fire with redding and milk, using a painter's brush. A sheet of zinc, covering the whole hearth, is cheap, saves work, and looks very well. A tinman can fit it properly.