Old Fashioned Recipes for Household Item
Source of Recipe
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Mending China
Pound flint glass very fine, then grind it on a painter's stone with the white of an egg; it will not break in the same place.
Writing Ink
Take four ounces of Nutgalls, Coperas and Gum Arabic, each two ounces, one quart of rain water; mix and shake up well, and often. If it is set in the sun, it will be the sooner fit for use.
Shoe Blacking
Take I quart of good vinegar, four ounces Ivory Black, one table spoonful of sweet oil, one gill of molasses, 1-2 an ounce oil vitriol; the vitriol to be put in last, and well stirred together.
To Destroy Flies
Take half a tea spoonful of black pepper made fine, a tea spoonful of brown sugar, a table spoonful of cream; lay in a plate and set it for them.
Get Rid of Bed Bugs
Dissolve one ounce of succotrine aloes in a gill of spirits, this will clear several bedsteads, with a trifling cost--mark the breadth of a finger with the solution, round the foot of each bedpost.
To Bleach Cotton
The first operation consists in scouring it in a slight alkaline solution; or what is better, by exposure to steam. It is afterwards put into a basket, and rinsed in running water. The immersion of cotton in an alkaline ley, however it may be rinsed, always leaves with it an earthy deposit. It is well known that cotton bears the action of acids better than hemp or flax; that time is even necessary before the action of them can be prejudicial to it; and by taking advantage of this valuable property in regard to bleaching, means have been found to free it from the earthy deposit, by pressing down the cotton in a very weak solution of sulphuric acid, and afterwards removing the acid by washing, lest too long remaining in it should destroy the cotton.
To Bleach Wool
The first kind of bleaching to which wool is subjected, is to free it from grease. This operation is called scouring. In manufactories, it is generally performed by an ammoniacal ley, formed of five measures of river water and one of stale urine; the wool is immersed for about twenty minutes in a bath of this mixture, heated to fifty six degrees; it is then taken out, suffered to drain, and then rinsed in running water: this manipulation softens the wool, and gives it the first degree of whiteness, it is then repeated a second, and even a third time, after which the wool is fit to be employed. In some places scouring is performed with water slightly impregnated with sop; and, indeed, for valuable articles, this process is preferable, but it is too expensive for articles of less value.
Sulphuric acid gas unites very easily with water, and in this combination it may be employed for bleaching wool and silk.
To Bleach Silk
Take a solution of caustic soda, so weak as to make only a fourth of a degree, at most, of the areometer for salts, and fill with it the boiler of the apparatus for bleaching with steam. Charge the frames with skeins of raw silk, and place them in the apparatus until it is full; then close the door and make the solution boil. Having continued the ebulution for twelve hours, slacken the fire, and open the door of the apparatus. The heat of the steam, which is always above 250 degrees, will have been sufficient to free the silk from the gum, and to scour it. Wash the skeins in warm water; and having wrong them, place them again on the frames in the apparatus to undergo a second boiling. Then wash them several times in water, and immerse them in water somewhat soapy, to give them a little softness. Notwithstanding the whiteness which silk acquires by these different alterations, it must be carried to a higher degree of splendour by exposing it to the action of sulpheric acid gas, in a close chamber, or by immersing it in sulphurous acid, as before recommended for wool.
Excellent perfume for gloves
Take of damask or rose scent, half an ounce, the spirit of cloves and mace, each a drachm; frankincense, one quarter of an ounce. Mix them together, and lay them in papers, and when hard, press the gloves; they will take the scent in twenty-four hours, and hardly ever lose it.
To perfume clothes
Take of oven-dried best cloves, cedar and rhubarb wood, each one ounce, beat them to a powder and sprinkle them in a box or chest, where they will create a most beautiful scent, and preserve the apparrel against moths.
To preserve brass ornaments
Brass ornaments, when not gilt or lackered, may be cleaned in the same way, and a fine colour may be given to them by two simple processes. The first is to beat sal ammoniac into a fine powder, then to moisten it with soft water, rubbing it on the ornaments, which must be heated over charcoal, and rubbed dry with bran and whiting. The second is to wash the brass work with roche alum boiled in strong ley, in the proportion of an ounce to a pint; when dry it must be rubbed with fine tripoli. Either of these processes will give to brass the briliancy of gold.
To make cement for metals
Take of gum mastic, 10 grains,--rectified spirit of wine, 2 drachms. Add 2 ounces of strong isinglass glue, made with brandy, and 10 grains of the true gum ammoniac. Dissolve all together,and keep it stopped in a phial. When intended to be used, set it in warm water.
To make red sealing wax
Take of shell-lac, well, powdered, two parts, of rosin and vermillion, powdered, each, 1 part. Mix them well together and melt them over a gentle fire, and when the ingredients seem thoroughly, incorporated, work the wax into sticks. Where shell-lac cannot be procured, seed-lac may be substituted for it.
The quantity of vermillion may be diminished without any injury to the sealing wax, where it is not required to be of the highest and brightest red colour; and the rest should be of the whitest kind, as that improves the effect of the vermillion.
Black sealing wax
Proceed as directed for the red wax, only instead of the vermillion substitute the best ivory black.
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