considered the best. The Havana is seldom clean. White sugar from
Brazil is sometimes very good. Refined sugars usually contain most of
the saccharine substance, therefore there is probably more economy in
using loaf, crushed, and granulated sugars, than we should at first
suppose.
Butter that is made in September and October is best for winter use.
Lard should be hard and white, and that which is taken from a hog not
over a year old, is best.
Rich cheese feels soft under the pressure of the finger. That which is
very strong is neither good or healthy. To keep one that is cut, tie
it up in a bag that will not admit flies, and hang it in a cool, dry
place. If mould appears on it, wipe it off with a dry cloth.
Flour and meal of all kinds should be kept in a cool, dry place.
The best rice is large, and has a clear, fresh look. Old rice
sometimes has little black insects inside the kernels.
The small white sago, called pearl sago, is the best. The large brown
kind has an earthy taste. These articles, and tapioca, ground rice,
&c., should be kept covered.
The cracked cocoa is the best, but that which is put up in pound papers
is often very good.
Shells are apt to be musty. Try a quarter of a pound before buying a
quantity.
To select nutmegs, prick them with a pin. If they are good, the oil
will instantly spread around the puncture.
Keep coffee by itself as its odor affects other articles. Keep tea in a
close chest or canister.
Oranges and lemons keep best wrapped close in soft paper, and laid in a
drawer of linen.
When a cask of molasses is bought, draw off a few quarts, else the
fermentation produced by moving it will burst the cask.
Bread and cake should be kept in a tin box or stone jar.
Salt cod should be kept in a dry place, where the odor of it will not
affect the air of the house. The best kind is that which is called
Dun, from its peculiar color. Fish-skin for clearing coffee should be
washed, dried, cut small, and kept in a box or paper bag.
Soft soap should be kept in a dry place in the cellar, and should not
be used till three months old.
Bar soap should be cut into pieces of a convenient size, and laid where
it will become dry. It is well to keep it several weeks before using
it, as it spends fast when it is new.
Cranberries will keep all winter in a firkin of water in the cellar.
Potatoes should be put into the cellar as soon as they are dug. Lying
exposed to the sun turns them green, and makes them watery. Some good
housekeepers have sods laid over barrels of potatoes not in immediate
use. To prevent them from sprouting in the spring, turn them out upon
the cellar-bottom.
To thaw frozen potatoes put them in hot water. To thaw frozen apples
put them in cold water. Neither will keep long after being frozen.
Cabbages should be buried in sand, with the roots upward.
Celery should also be buried in sand.
Turnips and beets should be put in a dry part of the cellar. Carrots
keep anywhere. Onions keep best spread, and in a cool place, but should
not freeze. Parsnips are best buried in a pit in the garden, and not
opened till March or April, in cold parts of the country.
Squashes should be kept in a dry place, and as cold as may be without
freezing.
Apples should remain out of doors in barrels till the weather becomes
too cold. They should not be headed up immediately after being
gathered, as a moisture accumulates upon them which causes them to
decay. When brought in, set them in a back room, until the weather
requires their being put into the cellar. A linen cloth laid over
them will keep them from frost till very cold weather. Many good
housekeepers prefer not to have apples headed up at all. There is an
advantage in being able to pick them over several times in the course
of a winter, as one defective apple injures all its neighbors. If they
are moist, wipe them.
Herbs should be gathered when just beginning to blossom; as they are
then in their perfection. Medicinal herbs should be dried, put up in
paper bags, and labelled. Those used in cooking should be pounded,
sifted, and put into labelled boxes or bottles. Herbs retain their
virtue best, to be dried by artificial heat. The warmth of an oven a
few hours after the bread is drawn, is sufficient.
Inspect every part of your house often, and let every place be neatly
kept. Habits of order in housekeeping save a great deal of time and
trouble, and the most thorough way of doing every thing, is the most
economical of labor and money, in the end.
Every thing used in the preparation of food should be kept clean. A
half washed pot or saucepan, or a dingy brass kettle, will spoil the
articles cooked in them. A lady should accustom herself to such habits
of attention to her household concerns, that careless ways on the part
of those who serve her, will not escape her observation. Unfaithfulness
in servants is the sure result of ignorance or negligence in the
housekeeper.
DIRECTIONS ABOUT WASHING, &c.
The design of these directions is to assist the inexperienced; to teach
those who are unacquainted with the business of washing, how to do it,
and those who can afford to employ others, how to direct them; and also
to discover where the fault lies when it is not done well.
As I write only for the uninitiated, I shall be excused for being very
minute; and for giving some preliminary hints, needed only by learners.
For the family wash, good water, and good soap are indispensable.
Rain, river, or spring water is best, but in some places the well-water
is soft, and good for washing. Clothes washed repeatedly in hard water
with common soap, will soon become too yellow to be worn, and can never
be made white again. As the supply of soft water sometimes fails where
a cistern is depended on, it may be well to mention that hard water
can be made to answer the purpose, temporarily, by dissolving in it
the sub-carbonate of soda, commonly called washing-soda. Put a large
table-spoonful into three or four pails of water while it is heating,
and then use the olive-soap both for rubbing and boiling the clothes.
Remember that soda must not be used in washing calicoes or flannels. It
will spoil both. Here it may be well to say that white clothes which
are constantly washed with soda, will, when laid aside a few months
become of a deep yellow color, not easily removed by any ordinary
bleaching process.
Provide a wash bench of convenient height, three tubs, one a large one
for rinsing,[19] a water ladle, a pail to be kept for use about the
washing alone, a washing board, a clothes stick, clothes pins, a line
and two baskets; one cheap coarse one in which to drain the clothes,
when taken from the boiling-kettle, and a better one for taking them
to the line, and for laying them in to when folded for the ironing.
Have good soft soap, which, if you cannot readily procure at the
manufactory, you can make with very little trouble.[20] Bar-soap is not
necessary for white clothes, provided the soft is of a nice quality.
The olive soap is a great improvement on the common yellow soap. If it
is several months old, it spends economically, cleanses quickly, and is
not sharp to the hands.
[19] A large painted wash-tub is expensive, and it may be convenient
to some persons to know that a very good rinsing tub can be made of
a flour barrel. Take one that is clean and well made; have the upper
part sawed off about nine inches. See that there are no nails sticking
through. Make three holes large enough to admit the fingers, in two
opposite staves, to serve for handles. If there are cracks, caulk them,
and fill the tub with water. The water will soon swell the staves so
as to close the cracks; and when it has once done leaking, keep it
always turned down in the cellar when not in use. All kinds of tubs and
firkins should be turned down on the cellar floor, to prevent them from
leaking.
[20] See two receipts, p. 197.
When clothes are very much soiled, they should be put into a tub of
warm suds over night.
_Borax soap_ is so effectual in cleansing soiled clothes, that the
use of it essentially diminishes the labor of washing. To prepare
it, put together bar soap, borax, and hot water in the following
proportions,--a pound of the soap, cut into small pieces, an ounce of
powdered borax, and a quart of hot water. Mix the ingredients together
over the fire, but see that it does not boil. When it is cold, cut it
up in cakes, and use it like common hard soap. Put the clothes which
are most soiled, or if you choose, all the white clothes of the wash
into quite a warm suds made with this soap, and let them remain from
Saturday evening until Monday morning. This method is recommended by
very good housekeepers.
_To do the Washing._ Sort the clothes, putting the finest and cleanest
by themselves, to be washed first and the coarse and more soiled
ones together. Where there are white clothes enough to make two or
three boilings, sort them accordingly; always boil coarse towels by
themselves. If there are fine calicoes, nice ginghams, or delicate
printed muslins, separate them from the common ones, and also the white
flannel, angola, or merino articles from the colored woollens.
The tub should be a third full of water, not hot, but very warm. Stir
in soap enough to make a weak suds, and put in the nicest clothes. Rub
handkerchiefs, night-caps, and other fine articles between the hands,
using a little soap. Never rub them on a washboard. As fast as they are
washed, wring and shake them open, and put them into an old pillow case
or white bag, else they will be liable to be torn by the weight of the
larger articles when taken out of the boiling kettle. Some persons keep
a large bag in which they boil all the white clothes together; if the
kettle is a nice one, so that there is no danger of iron mould, or any
kind of stain, it is better to boil them without it. Use a wash-board
for the large articles, and for those which are not easily made clean,
and use more soap than for the fine things, taking special pains with
places that are most soiled. All articles worn upon the person should
be washed on both sides, and special pains taken with seams and hems.
If there are streaks which you cannot entirely wash out, rub soap on
them after you have wrung out the article ready for the boiling.
Lay all the washed clothes together in an empty tub or the draining
basket, until you have enough for the first boiling. Then dip out all
the hot water from the kettle into a tub, and cover it over with a
thick cloth, in order to keep it hot for washing more clothes. Put a
pail or two of cold water into the kettle, and a large spoonful of
soft soap--more if the kettle is a large one. Shake open and lay in
the clothes, and add enough more water to cover them. Do not crowd
the boiler very full; the clothes will not look as well, and beside,
the water will be continually boiling over. Have a good fire, push
the clothes down often with the stick, and let them boil steadily,
half an hour. Set the draining basket upon a tub, with two or three
strips of board laid across, to keep it up. A little frame, somewhat
like the cheese ladder used in a dairy, is more convenient. Place the
tub near the boiler, and take out the clothes with the stick. When
this is done, dip out part of the boiling suds, cover it, and set it
aside to be used as occasion requires. Add cold water to the kettle,
and put in more clothes. Continue washing until all the white clothes
are rubbed, remembering to dip out part of the dirty water from the
tub now and then, and add some of the boiling suds which you have kept
covered. When the clothes in the basket are well drained, put them
into a tub of clean cold water, and take more clothes from the boiler
into the draining basket. When all the white clothes are rubbed, and
while the last of them are still boiling, get the second rinsing water
ready in the largest tub. (Some people have an idea that clothes look
best rinsed in hard water, because rain-water is not so white as the
other. But rain-water is the best, because it takes out the soap more
thoroughly.) Fill the rinsing tub two thirds full of water, squeeze the
blue-bag in it two or three times, and stir till the water is equally
blue.[21]
[21] _To make a blueing-bag_, take a very thick piece of cotton or a
doubled piece, and stitch a close seam near the edge, on three sides,
then turn it and stitch it round again; put in a piece of indigo as
large as an egg, sew the end twice across, and put on a loop. If it is
slightly made, too much of the indigo will come out into the water.
Keep it hung up where it will not become dusty.
The Spanish indigo is best. It is hard, and of a rich deep color.
Poor indigo breaks easily, and shows a slightly greenish tinge in the
sunlight.
When you wring the clothes from the first rinsing-water, see whether
the streaks you could not rub out have disappeared. If not, they can
probably be removed quickly now. Wring the clothes dry, else the suds
remaining in them will make the last rinsing water soapy. If the wash
is large, dip off part of the water, when half of the clothes are wrung
out, and add clean water, and a little more blueing. Strength, and some
practice are necessary, to wring large articles dry, and the appearance
of the clothes will but poorly pay for the labor bestowed, if this part
of the work is not well done. Perhaps it is the most fatiguing part
of washing. The inventor of a good machine for wringing clothes will
deserve and have, the thanks of many a toil-worn woman.
When the white clothes are upon the line, take boiling suds and wash
the coarse towels; boil them in a clean water, or in some of the
last rinsing-water. Wash them thoroughly as the table-cloths; not
negligently because they are coarse. If the weather is wet, let the
clothes lie in the rinsing-water till a fair day, but omit the blueing,
as it will be apt to settle in streaks upon them; or some of the
articles will be very blue, while others will not be so at all. If the
weather threatens to be rainy, better not put them out, as they cannot
be taken in half dry, and carried out while damp to be put on the line
again, without getting more or less soiled. If the wind is violent,
let them lie in the water even if it is fair (unless they can be hung
up in an attic or wood-house chamber or in a yard sheltered from the
wind), as the hems will very likely be snapped from the corners of the
sheets and table-cloths, and all the clothes will be more worn (even
if they are not torn) by being blown half a day, than by two months'
use from week to week. In the winter when they will freeze stiff in a
few minutes, and there is a strong wind, they are liable to be torn. I
have known a large and new table-cloth, cracked completely across, in a
few minutes after being hung out. Small and fine articles, like caps,
collars, handkerchiefs, and baby's dresses should be dried in the house
in severe winter weather. Clothes are made very white by the night
frosts, and where the yard is sheltered from the wind it is well to
leave them out sometimes for that reason, provided there is no danger
of their being stolen.
When the last boiling is done, dip out all the water and save it as
before. Heat clean water for the flannels and other woollens. These
should be washed in quite warm water with good soft soap. Bar-soap
makes woollens hard and wiry. Wash the finest and most delicate
articles first. If they are much soiled use considerable soap so as
to get them clean quickly without much rubbing, for it is this which
fulls up flannels, as we may know from the fact that it is by a similar
process cloth is made thick at the fulling-mill. As fast as they are
done throw them into a plenty of scalding water. If they lie in a pile
until all are washed, they will shrink. When you can bear your hands in
the water, wring them and throw them into another; from this last water
wring them dry, snap them well, and hang them out. Few people rinse
flannels twice, but they look enough better to pay for the trouble. If
the soap is not rinsed out, they will shrink, and also become yellow.
The water used for the white flannels is fit for the colored ones,
and for mixed footings, or calicoes. All sorts of stockings should be
washed first on the right side, and then upon the other.
Red flannel preserves the color best, and is softest, washed in hard
water. A sailor's red flannels, that have been, during a long voyage,
often tied to a rope and towed through the waves, look better and feel
softer than those washed at home. A word here in regard to the purchase
of flannels, will not be out of place. It is the best economy to buy
those made of soft wool. They will shrink very little, while coarse
wool flannels will grow small and thick every week, and no pains-taking
can prevent it.
After hanging out the woollens, wash the calicoes in clean water,
with hard soap, and rinse them twice. Have the starch[22] ready, and
dip them before they are hung up. Calicoes should be thrown into the
rinsing water as fast as they are washed. Even firm colors are injured
by lying. If the weather is not fair leave them in the second rinsing,
but put the light and dark ones into separate tubs, unless the colors
are perfectly fast. Put a little salt into the water. They will not be
injured any more than white clothes, by lying in the water over night.
Nice calicoes and ginghams should be dried in the shade, and so put
upon the line as to dry quickly. Hang a dress in an angle of the line
near the post, with the waist down; put one pin at the turn of the
line, and one on each side, a few feet from the angle, so that the hem
of the skirt will form a triangle. When the skirt is dry, except near
the waist, shake open the waist and sleeves, and reverse the dress,
pinning the shoulders to the line.
[22] To make starch, see page 240.
Calicoes should not be sprinkled till the morning of the day they
are ironed. The colors sometimes run together when they are folded
over night, and in very warm weather, the starch in a dress that is
sprinkled in the evening will become sour by the next morning. In July
and August, damp clothes that lie folded together two nights, are very
liable to become mildewed. Care should be taken that soiled articles
are not put aside in a damp state, during the week, for the next wash.
Sad accidents have occurred through want of care in this particular.
For the assistance of ladies who are not able to detect the reasons,
if their clothes do not come from the laundry in good order, I will
specify a few particulars as to the causes.
If good water and soap are provided, and yet the white clothes
look badly, it is owing to one, or possibly, all, of the following
things--their not being well assorted, the coarse clothes, and those
most soiled being washed and boiled with the best ones; or perhaps
those places which required special care, had no more rubbing than
other parts. If the seams of underclothes are not clean, it is because
they are not turned, after being washed on the right side, and well
rubbed on the other. If the clothes look yellow, perhaps the washer
uses too small a quantity of water, and neglects to dip off, often,
that which is cool and dirty, and add more which is hot; and very
likely too many are crowded into the boiler at once. If they are not
wrung dry from the first rinsing-water, before being thrown into the
second, they will be yellow; and lastly, if they are not well wrung out
of the second, they will have soapy streaks in the gathers and hems.
If spots of iron mould appear, perhaps the washer is not careful to
avoid touching the clothes while wet, to the wire handles of the tubs
or pails. If the calicoes fade more than you had reason to expect,
very likely they are washed in boiling suds. The soft soap in it will
spoil them; and besides, it is never clean enough for nice calicoes.
It is a good way to have calico dresses washed on some other day by
themselves; it will be easier to have them done well. If the flannels
are becoming dingy, it may be that they too are washed in the water in
which the white clothes were boiled, and then rinsed but once. If they
shrink, although made of fine wool, probably the soap is not all rinsed
out, and that they were laid together in a pile, and became cold before
they were thrown into scalding water. If they retain the wrinkles after
being ironed, they were not well shaken out (or snapped) before being
put out to dry. They should not be sprinkled; but if laid in the basket
over night with the folded white clothes, they will be just damp enough
to iron smooth. If the toes of the footings, and woollen stockings feel
stiff, they were not washed clean.
Some domestics bestow great care upon the nicest articles, and take no
pains with common ones. This is neither neat or economical. All clothes
that are both washed and ironed well, keep clean longest.
There are some advantages in a lady's taking the clothes from the
bars, after they are ironed, herself. She sees at once whether they are
well washed without the trouble of unfolding them to examine, and all
those which need mending can then be most conveniently laid apart from
the rest. I will only add to these minute directions, that the boiler
should be left perfectly dry, and the tubs, &c., rinsed and put away
clean. It is good economy after the usual cleaning is done, to save
all the suds to water the garden and trees. The good effects will soon
reward the trouble.
=Starching, Ironing, and Polishing Gentlemen's Linen.=
_To make the Starch_--Dissolve three table-spoonfuls of the best of
starch in cold water, and stir it very fast into a quart of boiling
water, and boil it half an hour. Five minutes before it is done, put
in a piece of spermaceti the size of a large walnut, and stir until it
is well mixed. Dip the linen as soon as you can bear your hands in the
starch, and see that every part is thoroughly wet, or you will have
what are called blisters. Fold the collars in a dry towel. Fold the
shirts through the middle up and down, so as to bring the two parts of
the bosom together, that the starch may not get on any other part of
the shirt. Let them lie over night.
A bosom board is indispensable. Have a piece of board eight inches by
eighteen; cover one side with three thicknesses of flannel; fasten
it at the edges with small tacks. Then cover both sides with three
thicknesses of cotton, sewed on tight and perfectly smooth.
Iron a shirt completely (the bosom upon the side of the board where
the flannel is), then hang it on the bars to air. After about an hour,
lay the bosom on the hard side of the board, dip a soft towel in cold
water, wring it dry, and brush the bosom until it looks a little damp.
Then lay it upon the softest side and use the polishing iron quickly,
pressing with all your strength. The polishing iron is very different
from the common flat-iron, and far better for this use. It is oblong,
and rounded at each end. They are to be found at all the hardware
stores, and are not expensive. If there is any roughness upon the iron,
touch it when nearly hot with bees-wax tied up in a rag.
A porcelain, or tin saucepan should be kept for making starch, and used
for nothing else. The linen ironed by the lady who furnished these
directions, was an ample recommendation of them.
=To wash Calicoes, the colors of which are not Fast.=