Stain Mixture.—Take an ounce of sal-ammoniac (or hartshorn) and an ounce of salt of tartar—mix them well, put them into a pint of soft water, and bottle it for use, keeping it very tightly corked. Pour a little of this liquid into a saucer, and wash in it those parts of a white article that have been stained with ink, mildew, fruit, or red wine. When the stains have, by this process, been removed, wash the article in the usual manner.
Chemical Renovating Balls—for taking out grease, paint, pitch, tar, from silks, stuffs, linen, woolen, carpets, hats, coats, &c., without fading the color or injuring the cloth:—¼ ounce of fuller's earth, ¼ ounce of pipe-clay, 1 ounce salt of tartar, 1 ounce beef gall, 1 ounce spirits of wine. Pound the hard parts and mix the ingredients well together. Wet the stain with cold water, rub it well with this ball, then sponge it with a wet sponge and the stain will disappear.
To Prevent Colored Things from Running.—Boil ¼ pound of soap till nearly dissolved, then add a small piece of alum and boil with it. Wash the things in this lather, but do not soap them. If they require a second water put alum to that also as well as to the rinsing and blue water. This will preserve them.
To Remove Stains from Mourning Dresses.—Take a good handful of fig-leaves, and boil them in two quarts of water until reduced to a pint. Squeeze the leaves and put the liquor into a bottle for use. The articles, whether of bombasin, crape, cloth, &c., need only be rubbed with a sponge dipped in the liquor, when the effect will be instantly produced. If any reason exists to prevent the substance from being wetted, then apply French chalk, which will absorb the grease from the finest texture without injury.
To Shrink New Flannel.—New flannel should always be shrunk or washed before it is made up, that it may be cut out more accurately, and that the grease which is used in manufacturing it may be extracted. First, cut off the list along the selvage edges of the whole piece. Then put it into warm (not boiling) water, without soap. Begin at one end of the piece, and rub it with both hands till you come to the other end; this is to get out the grease and the blue with which new white flannel is always tinged. Then do the same through another water. Rinse it through a clean, lukewarm water; wring it lengthways, and stretch it well. In hanging it out on a line do not suspend it in festoons, but spread it along the line straight and lengthways. If dried in festoons, the edges will be in great scollops, making it very difficult to cut out. It must be dried in the sun. When dry let it be stretched even, clapped with the hands, and rolled up tight and smoothly, till wanted.
Gum Arabic Starch.—Get two ounces of fine, white gum arabic, and pound it to powder. Next put it into a pitcher, and pour on it a pint or more of boiling water (according to the degree of strength you desire), and then, having covered it, let it set all night. In the morning, pour it carefully from the dregs into a clean bottle, cork it, and keep it for use. A table-spoonful of gum water stirred into a pint of starch that has been made in the usual manner, will give to lawns (either white or printed) a look of newness to which nothing else can restore them after washing. It is also good (much diluted) for thin white muslin and bobinet.
To Wash White Thread Gloves and Stockings.—These articles are so delicate as to require great care in washing, and they must not on any account be rubbed. Make a lather of white soap and cold water, and put it into a saucepan. Soap the gloves or stockings well, put them in, and set the saucepan over the fire. When they have come to a hard boil, take them off, and when cool enough for your hand, squeeze them in the water. Having prepared a fresh cold lather, boil them again in that. Then take the pan off the fire, and squeeze them well again, after which they can be stretched, dried, and then ironed on the wrong side.
To Clean Silk Stockings.—First wash the stockings in the usual manner, to take out the rough dirt. After rinsing them in clean water, wash them well in a fresh soap liquor. Then make a third soap liquor, which color with a little stone-blue; then wash the stockings once more, take them out, wring them, and particularly dry them. Now stove them with brimstone, and draw on a wooden leg two stockings, one upon the other, observing that the two fronts or outsides are face to face. Polish with a glass bottle. The two first liquors should be only lukewarm, but the third as hot as you can bear your hand in. Blondes and gauzes may be whitened in the same manner, but there should be a little gum put in the last liquor before they are stoved.
To Take out Mildew from Clothes.—Mix some soft soap with powdered starch, half as much salt, and the juice of a lemon, lay it on the part with a brush, let it be exposed in the air day and night, until the stain disappears. Iron-moulds may be removed by the salt of lemons. Many stains in linen may be taken out by dipping linen in sour buttermilk, and then drying it in the sun; afterwards wash it in cold water several times. Stains caused by acids may be removed by tying some pearlash up in the stained part; scrape some soap in cold, soft water, and boil the linen till the stain is out.
Bleaching Straw.—Straw is bleached, and straw bonnets cleaned, by putting them into a cask into which a few brimstone matches are placed lighted. The fumes of the sulphur have the effect of destroying the color, or whitening the straw. The same effect may be produced by dipping the straw into the chloride of lime dissolved in water.