# American Pocket Library of Useful Knowledge/Useful Directions

USEFUL DIRECTIONS.
Ink spilt on a carpet take up with a spoon, then pour on clean water and apply the spoon again, and repeat this till the stain is out.
Polish Mahogany by rubbing it once a week with cold drawn linseed oil, wipe off the oil, and rub with a dry cloth.
Flies.—Keep from frames, glass, &c., by boiling 4 leeks in pint water, and washing over with a soft brush.
Flannel.—Wash in hot, clean suds, and never rinse.
Wet Clothes should not be worn near a fire, or so as to occasion sudden heat. Keep in motion till dry can be had, then change at once, and give the feet a long heating.
Black Silks wash in warm small beer and milk.
Windows, clean with a damp linen cloth, then a dry one, then dust over powdered whiting in muslin, which clean off with wash-leather or dry cloth.
Clean Paint without using cloth. Remove dirt with a fine brush. If soiled, dip flannel in pearl ash or soda water, wash and dry quickly.
​Grease Spots are removed from cloth, silk, &c., by essence of lemon rubbed on with a rag.
Balls to take out grease spots. Moisten dry fuller’s earth with lemon juice, add powdered pearl ash, and mix well, and make in little balls—dry well in the sun. Use by moistening the spots with water, rub on the ball, then dry and brush off.
Moths are kept away by oil of lavender, tobacco, black pepper, or camphor.
Wood, for fuel, should be as dry as possible, as the heat required to evaporate the moisture in green wood is equivalent to a loss of 25 per cent.
Under Beds are made lasting, soft, elastic and sweet from the inner husks of corn.
Grease may be taken out of silk by powdered magnesia applied immediately to the wrong side.
Acid from apple butter, and some other acids, will sometimes decompose the glazing of earthen ware, and renders it a dangerous poison.
Bed Bugs may be removed by a strong decoction of the plant called water pepper, or smart weed. But the best remedy is strict cleanliness.
Pure Wine is made of 3 gallons water, 5 lbs. bloom raisins stoned, put in narrow-mouthed stone jug, covered with a fine rag, kept near fire ten days, and then racked off.
Beets roasted like potatoes are sweeter and richer than boiled.
Potatoes.—An Irish journal says: “Put them in a pot or kettle without a lid, with water just sufficient to cover them; after the water has come nearly to boil, pour it off, replace it with cold water, into which throw a good portion of salt—the cold water sends the heat from the surface to the heart, and makes the potatoes mealy—after they are boiled, and the water poured off, let them stand over the fire for 10 or 15 minutes to dry.”
Ink on Mahogany.—Take out by diluted vitriol, touch with a feather, then rub it quickly.
Ink.—Make with 2 gallons soft water, pound and half bruised galls, keep near a gentle heat for 2 or 3 weeks stirring often; then add half pound each of copperas, logwood chips, and gum arabic, some loaf sugar, lemon peel, and gill brandy.
Starch.—Peel and grate a quantity of potatoes, put the pulp in a coarse cloth, and press between two boards to a dry cake. The juice so pressed out, mix with equal quantity of water, and the starch settles at the bottom.
A Creaking Door prevent by rubbing soap or oil on the hinges.
Grease from boards or stone remove by strong ley of pearl ash mixed with as much unslacked lime as it will take up. Let it settle and bottle for use. When used, weaken with water, and scour off very quick, to prevent taking out the colour.
Crickets or roaches destroy by laying yellow snuff on their holes, wafers or assafœtida or elder bushes.
Iron mould, ink or mildew, take out of linen, (white only,) by oxalic acid.
Another.—Take out mildew by soft soap mixed with powdered starch, half as much salt, and the juice of lemon. Touch both sides, and lay on the grass night and day.
Many stains may be removed by dipping in sour milk, drying in hot sun, and wash in cold water.
Milk of Roses.—Mix 4 oz. oil almonds, half gill rose water, 40 drops oil of tartar.
Pomatum.—Beat a pound lard in water, then soak and beat in two rose waters, drain and beat with gill brandy. Let it drain from this, scent as you please, and keep it in small pots.
Cheese Whey is an exceedingly wholesome drink.
Carpets wear longer the oftener they are shook, as dust beneath grinds out. Never use a stiff broom, but keep a soft one or brush purposely for the carpet.
Straw carpet or matting wash with salt and water, and wipe with a clean dry cloth.
To black a hearth, boil black lead, soft soap, and a little water.
Clean Brass with flannel dipped in oil, then rub with fine rotten stone, and polish with wash leather.
Isinglass is a delicate starch for fine muslins.
Bed Curtains are unhealthy, from confining the air.
Old Bread is much improved by steaming it, or warming it over.
Keep lard in tin, salt pork fat in glazed earthen, salt in dry place, meal in cool, dry place, ice in the cellar, wrapped in flannel, vinegar in wood or glass.
Butter may be kept sweet for many months by 2 parts salt, 1 part loaf sugar pounded and well mixed; 1 ounce well mixed with each pound butter, and close up in a proper vessel.
Sore Throat.—Take a glass of olive or sweet oil, and a half a glass of the spirits of turpentine, mix them well together, and rub the throat externally, wearing flannel around it at the same time.
Whitewash.—Take clean lumps of well burnt lime, (say five or six quarts,) slack the same with hot water in a tub, (covered to keep in the steam,) pass it in the fluid form through a fine sieve; add one-fourth of a pound of whitening or burnt alum, pulverized; one pound of good sugar, three pints of rice flour, made into a thin and well boiled paste, and one pound of clean glue, dissolved by first soaking it well, and then putting it into a small kettle, which should be put into a large one filled with water, and placed over a slow fire. Add five gallons of hot water to the whole mixture. Apply with a painter’s brush warm, if upon the outside of the building—if within doors, cold. It will retain its brilliancy for many years.
A Durable Whitewash.—Before putting your lime, which should be unslacked, into the water, saturate the water with muriate of soda, (common salt.)
Beds, instead of being made up as soon as people rise out of them, ought to be turned down, and exposed to the fresh air from the open windows through the day.
To purify Water.—A table-spoonful of finely pulverised alum sprinkled into a barrel of water, the water stirred briskly.
Blacking.—8 oz. ivory black, 6 oz. molasses, 6 table-spoons sweet oil, 3 do. oil of vitriol, mix with 1 quart vinegar, bottle and use in a week.
Filthy smells in gutters, &c., obviate by using water in which lime has been slacked, mixed with ley of ashes, or soapy water that has been used in washing.
Charcoal, when burning, should have an uncovered vessel of boiling water over it, the vapour of which will counteract the deleterious fumes.
Powdered Charcoal will remove smells, impurities, &c., from old glass vessels, after the grosser parts have been scoured off with sand and potash.
A Perfume for linen, &c., is made of rose leaves dried in the shade, mixed with powdered cloves, scraped mace, and put in little bags.
Cement China with lime sifted through fine muslin, to be dusted on after the edges are moistened with white of egg. Join quickly, and tie secure.
Rust on Steel remove by sweet oil first, and in 48 hours rub with unslacked, powdered lime.
Mend iron pots, pans, &c., by sifted lime mixed with well beaten whites of eggs till reduced to paste, then add iron file dust, and cover the cracks, &c.
Mend Glass or China with 2 quarts litharge, 1 quick lime, and 1 of flint glass, separately powdered fine, and worked into a paste with drying oil.
Marble iron stains remove with spirits of vitriol and lemon juice mixed, wet the spots, and in few minutes rub with soft linen.
Clean Teeth.—1 quart soft water, 2 oz. lemon juice, 6 grains burnt alum, 6 grains salt. Mix. Boil a minute, strain and bottle for use. Rub teeth once a week with it. See page 29.
White Teeth.—Use a mixture of honey with purest pulverised charcoal, but not so often as to wear the enamel of the teeth.
Fire in chimneys extinguish by closing doors and windows, and throwing on the coals water, a handful flour of sulphur, or salt, and stop up the fire-place tight, so as to shut off all draft.
​Substitute for Tea.—5 parts of petals of red rose dried, 1 part rosemary leaves, 2 parts balm leaves. Mix. A desert-spoonful makes half a pint of infusion. Use with cream and sugar, same as tea. Instead of the injury to the nervous system which foreign tea occasions, this is found to strengthen the stomach and nerves, and keep up a healthy digestion. It is not only far more healthy, but more economical, and quite as palatable.
Another.—Young strawberry flowers and leaves dried, not in the sun, but in the air, and not washed, and used same as China tea, are used in Germany, and found a good substitute; also, young and tender leaves of the sloe tree, or black thorn, properly dried.
Hair.—Honey water promotes its growth, made by mixing 4 lbs. honey, and 2 lbs. dry sand in a large vessel; distil with gentle heat, to a yellowish acid water.—See page 29.
Sugar Vinegar.—1 gallon water, 2 lbs. brown sugar, and little yeast. Expose 6 months to the sun.
Cream and milk can be very well imitated by beating an egg, and then pouring boiling tea over it gradually, to prevent its curdling.
Bread should never be eaten until 1 day old. Unless where the digestive powers of an ostrich are possessed, fresh hot bread will sooner or later bring on Dyspepsia, with its train of miseries.