Paste for Wall-Paper.—Ten parts of flour are made into common paste; add one of glue boiled in hot water; add to the whole one-twentieth part of white of egg. This holds very firmly. Paste made with flour and gum-arabic, &c., does not mould or turn sour if it be mixed with a few drops of oil of cloves or carbolic acid.
Clay Mortar.—Where lime cannot be had, a very good mortar for chimneys may be made by mixing clay with common molasses. This is said (Lehner) to resist the action of heat when well dried.
Another fireproof cement is made as follows:—
| Clay | 40 |
| Flint-sand | 40 |
| Slacked lime | 4 |
| Borax | 2 |
This is mixed with a very little water. It is used as a wash, and should, when dry, be heated by fire.
Log cabins and houses built with wood are, in America, often swarming with vermin to a degree which would seem incredible. In all such cases the joints and cavities should be well packed and plastered with cement—lime if possible—and then whitewashed. Rat-holes should be plugged with stones or gravel and then cemented.
Zeiodeleth.—Vessels of wood, iron, stoneware, or of moulded cement, are often eaten away by the action of acids and alkalies. To prevent this they are in Germany coated with a composition called Zeiodeleth. In its simplest form this is simply sulphur mixed with very finely sifted flint-sand, or else ground glass, chinaware, or stone. Of this thin plates are also made to coat such vessels, or even to form them.
Merrick’s Zeiodeleth:—
| Sulphur | 20 |
| Glass-powder | 40 |
Böttger’s Zeiodeleth (Lehner):—