 |
|
Few persons know how to tie a knot, even women with their neatness in all other matters tie very badly. It is as easy, indeed more easy, to make a neat, firm knot, easy to untie, as one clumsy, insecure, and readily jammed. In practising, it is better at first to use a coarse cord or fine rope. The knots given below can all be mastered in an hour's practice, and will be found of daily use.
Also called the flat knot, is the one best adapted for ordinary use in tying the two ends of a string. It is neat, flat, does not readily slip, and is easily untied. It is the same as is used in tying shoe-laces and neck-ties, except that the ends are drawn through. It is essential that the two parts of each string should be on the same side or there will be formed a "granny" knot.
Also called the weavers' knot, is used where great firmness is required; it is small, cannot slip, and can be made when one end of the string is just long enough to make a loop. It is more liable to jam than the one last named. Bend one end of the cord into a loop, which hold in the left hand, pass the other end through the loop, around it and then under itself. A little practice will enable the learner to use both hands at once, in which case it can be tied very quickly. It is easily made after learning the flat knot, by passing one end across or under the loop instead of through it. It is obvious that in having the free end of the loop long it can be used instead of another end, and thus heavy bodies, as window-sash weights and clock weights are hung.
Is used for fastening broken sticks or rods after serving them with several turns of the cord which should never overlap. Before beginning the serving make a loop a little longer than the proposed extent of the turns (a Fig. 3). When the serving is finished pass the end of the cord through this loop, and by pulling in its free end the other is drawn within the serving and made secure (b Fig. 3).
Is made more quickly than any other tie, can be instantly undone, and is very secure. It is used to fasten ends of ropes in rings, etc., when they are to be quickly cast off, and may be used for slinging light bodies of small diameter. It is also put over the tops of bottles to fasten in the corks, and is then called the beer-knot: in this case the two ends are afterwards tied. By reversing it it becomes a running knot, or "sailor's knot." In practising, at first take the fixed or "standing" part of the line in the left hand, make a loop in it: then make a second loop in the righthand part, and put it through the first (a, Fig. 4). Afterwards try it through rings. and around rods and small posts (b, Fig. 4). For large posts use the glove hitch; the single half-hitch will slip. Remember that when it is to hold, the strain must come on the standing part. It differs but slightly from the common single bow-knot, and can be made as easily with a little practice.
One of the most useful of all fastenings; it is not properly a knot, for it is neither tied nor untied. It is largely employed on ship-board and in reducing dislocations, but opportunities for its use in ordinary life are of daily occurrence. In practicing, take the fixed or standing part of the rope in the left hand, turn the free end under it, and put it over the thumb; repent this, and the hitch is made. (Fig. 5.) When the clove-hitch is made on the standing part of the rope, after it has passed around a post or box, it is called two half-hitches, and is the best method of fastening boxes or bundles. In this case it should never be fastened to the cord at right angles to its own, but that in a line with it. (Fig. 6.)
Is used in slinging heavy bodies; it cannot slip, and will never jam under the heaviest strain. It is difficult to understand at first, but with a little practice can be made very rapidly. Take the fixed or standing part of the rope in the left hand (this should be done in making all knots), lay the free end over it, and then by a twist of the wrist make a loop in the standing part which shall inclose the free end (a, Fig. 7); then carry the free end behind the standing part and through the loop, parallel with itself (b. Fig. 7). This knot will well repay the trouble spent in learning it.
Cast on 200 stitches on needles No. 7.
First Row. - Knit two; knit two together; thread forward; knit one; thread forward; knit two together; knit one; knit two together; thread forward; knit one; thread forward; knit two together; knit one.
Second Row. - Plain knitting.
Third Row. - Knit two together; knit one; thread forward; knit three; thread forward; knit three together; thread forward; knit three; thread forward; knit three together. At the end of this row plain knit the two last stitches.
Fourth Row. - Plain knitting.
Fifth Row. - Knit two; thread forward; knit two together; knit one; knit two together; thread forward; knit one; thread forward; knit two together; knit one; knit two together; thread forward; knit one.
Sixth Row. -- Plain knitting.
Seventh Row. - Knit three; thread forward; knit three together; thread forward; knit three; thread forward; knit three together; thread forward. At the end of this row bring the thread forward; knit two.
Eighth Row. -- Plain knitting.
These eight rows must be repeated until a square is knitted.
Cast on 600 stitches on needles No. 3.
First Row. -- Knit two together four times; thread forward; knit one eight times; knit two together four times; purl one; knit two together four times; thread forward; knit one eight times; knit two together four times; purl one.
Second Row. -- Purl knitting.
Third Row. -- Plain knitting.
Fourth Row. -- Purl; commence again as at first row. After having knitted a piece half a yard in depth. knit six rows plain and purled alternately; then six rows of holes, worked thus: one row plain, second row thread forward, knit two in one, and so on; third plain; then six rows of plain and purled. To form the corner two and three stitches must be knitted together in the centre and at the ends, commencing from the plain rows.
Cast on 70 or 80 stitches.
First, Second, and Third Rows. - Plain knitting.
Fourth Row. - Bring the wool forward; knit two together, taken at the back; continue the same to the end of the row.
Repeat these 4 rows until the piece be about 18 inches long, admitting that the shading comes in correctly.
Two No. 19 needles are required, and double German wool, in 4 distinct shades, to match the color of sable. Commence with the lightest shade; then the second, third, and darkest, reversing them again to the lightest.
Cast on 45 stitches.
Every row is worked the came, with a slip-stitch at the beginning; knit one; purl one; repeat to the end of the row.
It will require a piece of about 20 inches long to make a moderate-sized muff, which must be lined with silk, and stuffed with wool and a sufficient quantity of horse-hair to retain it in shape. Cord and tassels to match the color of the muff may be sewn at the ends, or it may be drawn up with ribbons.
Make a chain of fifteen stitches in single crochet; crochet two stitches in the middle stitch of every row, until you have completed twelve rows, which is sufficient for the front. Take up twelve stitches on one side; crochet thirty rows, and join them to the other side of the front; then catch the stitches up round the top, and crochet one row.
For the frill, crochet the stitches in every loop in single crochet, very loose, to form a full frill.
When finished, turn the slipper inside out, and sew in a cork sole; then pass the ribbon round under the frill and tie in front in a bow. The above is exceedingly pretty in shaded Berlin wool.
The breeding cage should have plenty of fine gravel or sea-sand at the bottom, and a lump of old mortar, for the birds to pick. Goats' hair must be supplied for the nest. The birds when put up should be fed on bread, the yolk of boiled eggs and a little sugar. Let them have fresh greens in moderation. The birds should not be allowed to breed more than twice or thrice a year. The period of incubation is 14 days: in very warm weather, 13. The last of March is early enough to put the birds in the breeding-cage.
If the hen desert her eggs, they are probably bad, and should be thrown out.
If the hen eat her eggs, feed her well very early in the morning, or late at night. If the male break the eggs, let him have two hens; these must not be allowed in the same cage, or they will fight.
If the hen neglect to feed her young, stir her out of the nest and supply her with an abundance of delicate food. As soon as the young are hatched, place beside the usual feeding-trough a cup containing finely grated hard-boiled egg and stale bread rubbed fine and soaked in milk; also, one containing crushed rape-seed, boiled and afterwards washed with fresh water.
The young may be placed in separate cages in about 4 weeks.
Canary-seed alone is sufficient, but usually a mixture of canary, hemp, millet and rape, known as bird-seed, is used. Each cage should have a piece of cuttle-fish bone. Food is best supplied in the evening, and all stale food and refuse of every kind should be removed daily. The bottom of the cage should be strewn with fine gravel or sand, fresh water supplied daily, and a saucer of water for bathing twice a week. Greens should be cautiously supplied.
The throat of the male vibrates while singing; this never happens with the hen. The males are larger, more yellow above the bill, under the throat and in the pinion of the wings. The body of the male is longer and more tapering.
Birds with long, straight and tapering bodies are the best singers. By putting 2 or 3 birds together they will vie with each other.
Surfeit from improper or excessive food is shown by swelling of the belly, which, on blowing up the feathers, appears transparent and covered with little bloodvessels. In birds from 1 to 3 years old it shows itself in scabs and humors about the head. Take away canary-seed, and add some grits, which will purge; put a little saffron in water. Anoint the affected parts with almond-oil.
Husk, from cold. It produces a dry, husky cough, and is difficult to cure. Give them some flax-seed mixed with the bird-seed and a little rock-candy in the water, and for a few mornings a little boiled bread and milk.
Excessive perspiration from a warm season, confined locality, or sitting too closely on the nest. The feathers are ruffled and damp, and the bird feeble. Wash with salt and water for several mornings, or sprinkle a few drops of sherry over the bird, and put it in the sun to dry.
Egg-bound, from cold. Give the bird a little moist sugar, or anoint the abdomen with warm sweet oil; if these fail, give a drop of castor-oil.
Moulting. - Avoid cold, give sunshine, some bread and egg, with saffron in the water.
Sneezing is caused by obstruction of the nostril, which may be removed by a small quill.
Fits. -- Plunge the bird suddenly into cold water, and cut two of its claws short enough for the blood to run.
Lice. -- Allow the birds to bathe frequently; keep the cage very clean, with plenty of dry sand in the bottom. Put some hollow sticks in the cage; the lice will collect in them, and may be removed.
Drooping. -- When a bird continues sickly without apparent cause, give a little powdered charcoal mixed with bread and egg.
Accidents. -- For a broken leg or wing, put the bird in a cage without perches, and covered at the bottom with soft hay. Let its food be within easy reach, and keep the cage covered.
"The breed of dogs which I prefer, beyond all others, are those which are bred between a setter and a pointer, but not bred from those setters which have no natural point in them, far I have no idea of shooting to a dog which does not stop at birds the very first day he is taken into the field. I have not had a setter which was broken by force for above 20 years, nor ever will have one. Leave them at home only one week, for the next two days you must turn to dog-breaking, and not to shooting. I prefer those between a pointer and a setter, which take after the setter, for, generally speaking, they have better feet, which is a great point in a dog, for certain they have more hair on their feet, which is a great preservative to the foot, if it be kept clean. I never kept a cocker spaniel in my life; I always shoot to pointers, even in the strongest covers, with bells round their necks. I know, for certain, you will not find so much game, but then what you find you are sure to shoot at. Here is the great benefit of shooting to pointers: you may shoot every day in a wood, and not drive the game away. But, if you turn cocking spaniels into a wood, which quest, when they come on to the foot of a pheasant, in a very few days you will drive every pheasant out of the wood. A Newfoundland dog, tutored to keep behind you in the fields, and not to go above a dozen or twenty yards from you in a wood, is of wonderful utility in retrieving and bringing wounded game. I have had several that were uncommonly useful."
A dog has a very visible mark in his teeth, well as a horse, which mark does not disappear totally until he is very near or full 6 years old. Look to the 4 front teeth, both in the upper and lower jaw, but particularly to the teeth in the upper jaw, for in those 4 front teeth the mark remains the longest. At 12 months old you will observe every one of the 4 front teeth, both in the upper and under jaw, jagged and uneven, nearly in the form of a fleur de lis, but not quite so pointed at the edges of the jags as a fleur de lis is. As the dog advances in age these marks will wear away, gradually decrease and grow smoother and less jagged every year. Between 3 and 4 years old these marks will be full half worn down, and when you observe all the 4 front teeth, both in the upper and lower jaw, quite worn smooth and even, and not in the least jagged, then you may conclude that the dog is nearly if not full 6 years old. When those marks are worn quite flat and even, and those teeth quite level and even, you can no longer judge the age of a dog. Many huntsmen and game-keepers ignorantly look at the side and eye-teeth of a dog; there are many dogs not 2 years old which have had the canker in the mouth, with hardly one sound tooth in their heads.
Is characterized by a running from the nose and eyes, and a short dry cough, followed by a wasting of the flesh, and loss of strength and spirits. At length the brain suffers, and fits, paralysis of the extremities, or convulsions come on. Give a teaspoonful of magnesia every other night, or the same quantity of washed flowers of sulphur.
Is allied to the itch in man, and requires the same treatment. Wash with soft soap, and apply sulphur ointment.
Are a frequent cause of fits, and when they get into the nostrils, windpipe, etc., generally cause death. For those in the bowels, Youatt recommends powdered glass made up into a roll with butter or lard. Cowhage (cow-itch, mucuna) is probably quite as effectual, and is safer. A teaspoonful may be given in lard, and repeated if necessary. Turpentine should not be given to dogs.
Take a fine round of beef, 4 oz. of saltpetre, 3/4 of an oz. of allspice; rub it well on the beef, and let it stand 24 hours; then rub in as much common salt as will salt it. Lay it by 12 days, turning it every day; then put it into a pan, such as large pies are baked in, with 3 or 4 lbs. of beef-suet, some under, some over. Cover it with a thick crust, and bake it for 6 hours. It will keep for two months, and most excellent it is.
Is the pyrethrum roseum Caucasicum. The central or tubular florets are alone used. They are ground to powder. Although destructive to insect life it is harmless to man or domestic animals.
1. Mercurial ointment well rubbed on the infected part and washed off with warm water and soap. In the army a common practice was to wear a string saturated with the ointment around the waist as a means of protection. This might produce salivation.
2. Corrosive sublimate, 1 dr.; sal ammoniac, 2 drs.; water, 8 oz. This is to be used as the first; it is more cleanly.
3. Coculus indicus, 1 oz.; boiling water, 1 pt.; use when cool.
Wash with infusion of coculus Indicus, or with coaloil, and then with soap and warm water.
By scattering chloride of lime on a plank in a stable, biting fleas are driven away. Sprinkling beds of vegetables with a weak solution of this salt effectually preserves them from caterpillars, slugs, moths, etc. It has the same effect when sprinkled on fruit trees or shrubbery. Mixed in a paste with fatty matter and applied in a narrow band around the trees, it prevents insects from creeping up.
At a late meeting of the Cincinnati Horticultural Society, Mr. Wells made the following statements:
He said he had found coal-oil a very effectual remedy for all insects, both on plants and trees. When he desired to rid his trees of the troublesome pests, as had been the case a year ago, when his plum crop threatened from their inroads to be a total failure, he had used with entire success the following truly valuable preparation: One pt. of soft soap mixed with half the quantity of coal-oil, the whole then being stirred into 7 or 8 galls. of rain-water. The application he had made with a powerful syringe, deluging the tops after the blossoming of the tree, and when the immature fruit began to fall, continuing the operation for 3 or 4 nights in succession, and afterwards once or twice a week.
He had also tried coal-oil on his cabbage plants, to prevent the depredations of the cut-worm, and had found the remedy uniformly successful. In this case he saturated the coarse chips from a planing-mill with undiluted oil, placing a handful of them, so prepared, around each plant.
He had tried experiments on plants, using different preventions with the following results: One hundred cabbage plants treated in the customary manner, with ashes, were still attacked by the worm, and suffered from the depredations of the louse. One hundred plants surrounded with common planing-mill chips - one plant slightly eaten; worm found dead beneath the leaves. One hundred plants surrounded with chips saturated with coal-oil - free from lice and untouched by the worm. He had been equally fortunate in his application of coal-oil to melon and other vines to prevent the inroads of the bugs.
Water the plants with a solution of carbonate of ammonia, 1 oz. to the gallon. They will come to the surface and perish. The ammonia will promote the growth of the plants.
Put a drachm of phosphorus in a flask with 2 oz. of water; plunge the flask into hot water, and when the phosphorus is melted, pour the contents into a mortar with 2 or 3 oz. of lard. Triturate briskly, adding water, and 1/2 lb. of flour, with 1 or 2 oz. of brown sugar. Plaster of Paris, with oatmeal, is said to destroy roaches.
These are made with flour, suger, and red-lead, heated in wafer irons.
Procure a large sponge, wash it well and press it dry, which will leave the cells quite open; then sprinkle it with fine white sugar, and place it near where the ants are troublesome. The ants will soon collect upon the sponge, and take up their abode in its cells. It is then only necessary to dip the sponge in boiling water, when the ants will be destroyed, and it may be set over and over again. Cyanide of potassium is employed in Cuba, but is a violent poison and its use is not recommended.
Draw a line with a brush dipped in the following solution around the shelf to be protected. The ants will not cross it. Corrosive sublimate, 1 oz.; muriate of ammonia, 2 oz.; water, 1 pint. This solution may also he used to destroy bed-bugs by applying it to the cracks with a feather or brush.
In M. Louvel's plan the grain is put into a hollow cast-iron cylinder, from which the air is partially exhausted. No animal can there live; fermentation itself ceases as it has neither air nor moisture. On the large scale, the vacuum is created by filling a communicating cylinder with steam, which is then condensed. A vacuum of 20 inches is quite sufficient.
If the articles are to he wrapped up, enclose camphor, snuff, or Persian insect powder. Furs should be kept in cedar boxes, and opened out and beaten occasionally during the summer. It is stated that the Russians preserve furs by wrapping up with them a quill containing a small quantity of mercury and securely corked. In collections of birds open bottles of ether are placed in the cases; benzine is much cheaper and would probably answer. When articles become infested the surest remedy is to bake them in an oven at a temperature below that which would scorch them. Feathers may be preserved by dipping them in a solution of 16 grs. of strychnia in a pint of alcohol.
Take of bromine, 2 1/2 drs.; iodide of potassium 2 grs.; corrosive sublimate, 1 gr.; diluted alcohol 30 fl. drs. Dose, 1 fl. dr., in 1 tablespoonful of wine or brandy, to be repeated as required by the case.
The local pain produced by the bites and stings of reptiles and insects, in general, is greatly relieved by the following application: Make a lotion of 5 oz. of distilled water, and 1 oz. of tincture of opium. To be applied immediately.
Another. -- Mix 5 1/2 oz. of soft water, and 1/2 oz. of water of ammonia. Wash the part repeatedly with this lotion until the pain abates.
The bedsteads ought to he taken down three or four times a year, the screws rubbed with pure oil, and a good manual cleaning given to all its parts. This plan, which has been slightly noticed under the general head of cleanliness, will render all poisonous mixtures unnecessary.
A wasp or bee swallowed may be killed before it can do harm by taking a teaspoonful of common salt dissolved in water. It kills the insect and cures the sting. Salt at all times is a good cure for external stings; sweet-oil, pounded mallows, or onions, powdered chalk made into a paste with water, or weak ammonia, are also efficacious.
If bees swarm upon the head, smoke tobacco and hold an empty hive over the head, and they will enter it.
This name, meaning rock oil, is applied to certain bituminous fluids found in the earth. Solid bitumen, or asphalt, differs but little in chemical composition from petroleum, both being compounds of carbon and hydrogen
Many varieties of petroleum, and perhaps all, become thicker by exposure to the air, and finally solid, resembling asphaltum. Bitumen, and doubtless petroleum also, was known from the earliest ages, being the "pitch" which Noah used in building the Ark, and the "slime" used for mortar in the Tower of Babel, being dug from pits in the Valley of Sodom, precisely as is done in the same region at the present day, where the Arabs annually extract considerable quantities
The fluid petroleum has been collected in Burmah for at least 16 centuries. It is used by the inhabitants for light and fuel. The product obtained at the present time, from 520 wells, is said to be 420,000 hogsheads annually. In the United States, petroleum is not, as many suppose, a new discovery. Years ago springs of it were known at many localities, but its use was very limited. No method of purifying it was known, so that it was looked upon as valueless, and several wells bored for salt water were abandoned on account of the oil rendering the salt impure. In 1861 it was purified, and introduced extensively as an illuminating oil, to take the place of burning fluid (camphene and alcohol), the price of which was greatly enhanced, and which, by the explosive qualities of its vapor, was causing many severe accidents. The trade increased, new wells were bored, and some of them yielding several hundred barrels a day, and making their possessors at once wealthy, started what has been known as the oil fever. Lands sold for fabulous prices, sometimes for 500 times as much as 2 or 3 years before.
Petroleum has probably been formed by a slow decomposition of organic matter under the earth's surface. It is found in cavities and crevices, and through the substance of the rock. In mining for it a well 3 or 4 inches in diameter, and sometimes 700 or 800 feet deep, is bored by drills, generally by steam-power. When rock containing petroleum is being bored through, what is called "a show of oil" is found. The chips and water drawn up from the well show and smell of the oil, but, unless the drill strikes a cavity or crevice filled with oil, the well isn't productive. This uncertainty is the most unfortunate peculiarity of oilmining, and makes it, to a great extent, a lottery, for there are no surface indications by which these cavities can be discovered.
Petroleum is much lighter than water, of a dark green or black color, with a peculiar and, to most persons, unpleasant odor. It is commercially divided into two kinds, the heavy, or lubricating oil, and the light oil. The former is more dense, and sometimes of the consistence of thin molasses. It is used, without preparation, for lubricating machinery, for which it is admirably suited. The light oil, before it can be used, is submitted to several purifying processes, the most important of which is distillation.
For this purpose the crude oil is pumped into stills holding from 200 to 1000 galls. each, and submitted to a gradually increasing heat, the vapors being passed through a worm immersed in cold water. At first there comes over a very light, mobile, and volatile liquid exceedingly inflammable. This is benzine, largely used as a cheap substitute for turpentine in painting, and as a solvent for India-rubber. It differs from benzole (obtained by distillation from coal-gas tar), and the beautiful colors obtained from the latter cannot be made from the benzine of Petroleum. The terms benzine and benzole are often confounded, and even used as synonyms, but the name benzole is properly applied only to one of the many substances contained in coal-tar, and from which the aniline colors are obtained.
Next, there condenses a less volatile and inflammable liquid, of greater specific gravity. This is the burning oil, and is generally the most abundant and valuable product. When the heat rises to near 500° Fahr., the oil that comes over is no longer suitable for burning, but is an excellent lubricant for light machinery. Finally, a substance (paraffine) solid at common temperatures, distils over, and there remains in the retort, as the heat has been less or greater, a thick tarry matter, or a porous coke. When the lubricating oil, just mentioned, is exposed to cold, a considerable portion of paraffine separates from it, and can be collected upon filters, purified, and used for candles, and for other purposes.
All these products, and especially the burning oil, require further purification after the distillation. This usually consists in agitation, first with water, followed by strong sulphuric acid, caustic soda, and finished with water. The effect of this is to render the oil colorless, and to diminish the odor.
The relative amount of these several products varies very greatly in different regions, and indeed in the oil of different wells in the same region. Thus, the oil from Canada contains little or no benzine, much burning oil, and much paraffine, while that from Ohio and Western Virginia contains much benzine, about the same amount of burning oil as the former, and but little paraffine.
Petroleum is found in many localities on this continent. Among these may be mentioned as the most important, Canada West, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Western Virginia, California, Kentucky, and Tennessee. The first four yield more than nine-tenths of all now obtained, but it is probable that other regions will yield equally well when as thoroughly explored.
Burning oil is sometimes adulterated with benzine, or with the heavy oil. To detect the former, pour an ounce or two into a small tin cup, and put it on a stove or over a lamp, placing the bulb of a thermometer in the oil. Then as the temperature rises, try with a lighted taper when the oil gives off inflammable vapor. If this be below 100°--110° Fahr., the oil is dangerous to use, as its vapor becoming mixed with air in the lamp may take fire and explode. The adulteration with heavy oil is shown by dirtiness of the flame after having burned for some time, accompanied by a charring of the wick.
Water, unless in overwhelming quantity, will not extinguish the flame of petroleum or benzine. It may, however, be speedily smothered by a woollen cloth, or carpet, or a wet muslin or linen cloth, or earth or sand being thrown over it. These act by excluding the air, without which combustion cannot be maintained.
This telegraph is based upon the principle that a magnet may be endowed and deprived at will with the peculiarity of attracting iron by connecting or disconnecting it with a galvanic battery; all magnetic telegraphs are based solely upon this principle. The telegraphs bearing the names of the several inventors, as Morse (who may be called the pioneer in this invention), House, Bain, etc., are simply modifications in the application of this great principle.
It is by breaking off the magnetic circuit, which is done near the battery, that certain marks are produced by means of a style or lever, which is depressed when the current is complete, and of the length of the interval of the breaking of this current, that signs of different appearances and lengths are produced and written out upon paper, making in themselves a hieroglyphic alphabet, readable to those who understand the key. This is the entire principle of electromagnetic telegraphing.
It was formerly considered necessary to use a second wire to complete the magnetic circuit, now but one wire is used, and the earth is made to perform the office of the other.
Where the distance is great between the places to be communicated with a relay battery is necessary to increase the electric current, and in this manner lines of great length may be formed.
The House apparatus differs from the Morse only that by means of an instrument resembling a piano-forte, having a key for every letter, the operator, by pressing upon these keys, can reproduce these letters at the station at the other end of the line, and have them printed in ordinary printing type upon strips of paper, instead of the characters employed on the Morse instrument to represent these letters.
The Bain telegraph differs from either of the two preceding methods, simply in employing the ends of the wires themselves, without the means of a magnet or style to press upon the paper, the paper being first chemically prepared; so that when the circuit of electricity is complete, the current passes through the paper from the point of the wires, and decomposes a chemical compound, with which the paper is prepared, and leaves the necessary marks upon it. There is not the same need for relay batteries upon this line as upon the others.
The greatest and most important telegraphic attempt is the successful laying of the cable across the Atlantic Ocean, which was finally completed and open for business July 28th, 1866. The cable lost in mid ocean in the unsuccessful attempt of the summer of 1866, has been recovered, and now forms the second cable laid, connecting the Eastern with the Western Continent.
The operation of telegraphing is very simple, and can easily be learned, being purely mechanical.
Double-entry book-keeping consists simply in this great principle -- that every debit must have a corresponding credit, and every credit a corresponding debit. This simple rule is the whole theory of Double-entry book-keeping. For instance, you charge a person with $100 worth of merchandise. Merchandise must have a corresponding credit of $100 for producing this debit or charge; and the entry would read thus: -- A. B. to Merchandise, Dr. $100; Merchandise, Cr. by A. B., $100; thus making an equalization in the two entries.
Two other short rules in book-keeping are important:
Debit, that which cost us value.
Credit, that which produces us value.
Merchandise in the case above cited, produced the charge to the individual, hence merchandize gets credit, and the party who receives gets the charge or debit.
Is used to enter all daily transactions, as its name imports, excepting those belonging to Cash.
For cash entries only. The left hand, or debit side, for receipts; the right hand, or credit side, for payments.
To arrange together in more convenient form for posting (or entering into the Ledger) the several entries in the Day-Book, Cash-Book, and such other books as may be kept.
Is to contain the final results of the preceding books, arranged under their proper heads. The left hand side, in individual accounts, shows all the party owes -- the right hand side, his payments, or other credits due him.
The Editor of this work recommends the following (furnished by a practical printer, Mr. J. H. Morris) to the attention of authors, editors, and all those who write for the press:
As there are not a few who undertake to write for newspapers and to "make books," who do not appear to know how to prepare their copy, the writer of this article, who knows how copy should be prepared, respectfully offers a few suggestions:
A sentence, composed of fine, well-chosen words, may be so marred by inaccurate punctuation and arrangement, as to seem to an ordinary reader but a senseless string of words. Now, it is the interest of an author, as well as his duty, not only to select the words, but to arrange and punctuate them so that his meaning may be readily perceived by any reader possessed of common sense. This duty should not be forced upon the compositor. It is no part of a compositor's business to edit what he "sets up ;" in fact, it is not generous, or even just, to expect him to lose time (which to him is bread) in "making sense" by punctuating, capitalizing, paragraphing, or otherwise arranging, his copy.
Copy should be written only on one side of each leaf, in a clear, legible hand, and, as far as possible, without erasures or interlineations; when these are unavoidable, they should be so marked as to leave no excuse for mistake. Proper names, technical or scientific terms, and all unusual words, should be so written as to show each letter distinctly. If the author wish a word emphasized by Italics or SMALL CAPITALS, he should underscore it, with one line for the former, and two lines for the latter; three lines under a word indicate that it is to be in CAPITALS. It is always safer to indicate where paragraphs are to be commenced by prefixing to the first word the paragraph mark. When a word is to have a capital initial letter, it is well to make three strokes under the letter, though this is unnecessary if the writer makes an unmistakable difference between his capitals and lower case or common letters. If cuts or engravings are to be inserted, they should all be ready before the copy is put in hand, and should be marked in just where the author wishes them inserted. If the work contain formulae, algebraic problems, tables, or other peculiar matter, special care should be bestowed upon them, so as to have their arrangement clear to the compositor; it must be borne in mind that not every first-rate compositor understands the sciences and kindred subjects. The author should always make his commas, semi-colons, colons, periods, dashes, parentheses, etc., just where he wishes them to appear in print. If the work is to be set in different sizes or styles of type, the copy be marked accordingly. Poetry should always be properly indented by the author.
In short, copy should be, in all respects, prepared as it is intended to appear in print, so that the author need see no proof, or if he desire, for any reason, to see proofs, it may be unnecessary for him to make alterations. It should be borne in mind that the making of alterations is charged extra by the compositor, and, in proportion as they are numerous, they entail a heavy extra outlay on the part of the publisher.
It was proposed to give some rules for punctuation, but to be reasonably exact in giving such rules would take up more space than such a work as this can spare; hence, I will only say that, as the object of punctuation is to make the meaning of the author clear to the reader, commas and other points should only be used where the sense would be obscure without them.
The following example of proof-marking. with the brief remarks appended, may be instructive to authors and others who are called upon to read proof, as well as interesting to the curious:
WHILE there has been much diversity of opinion with respect to the name of the inventor (as well as the time of the invention) of Printing, there can be no question but that to PETER SCHOEFFER of Gernsheim belongs the honor of originating the casting of metal letters, thus utilizing the art of arts.He had learned from the world-renowned Guttembergs the art of cutting letters from wood. Not satisfied with this slow, tedious mode of making letters, he happily hit upon the expedient of cutting the characters each in a matrix; in this the letters might be cast, and thus many letters might be made in the same time that it had formerly taken, by the cutting method, to make each one.
Faust was so pleased with Schoeffer's discovery, that he gave him his only daughter Christina in marriage.
Little did either anticipate the vast triumphs to be achieved by this discovery.
The caption to an article is sometimes run in before the first paragraph with a period and short dash, .- (in which case Italics or SMALL CAPITALS are generally used); but usually it is put above the article, in the centre of the line, in capitals, as in the example, or in some appropriate head-letter.
The marks above explain themselves, but, although in my efforts to illustrate as many marks as possible, I have made the example dirtier than I should like to see the proof of any fellow-craftsman, I yet have been unable to show all the marks that are used in correcting proof. Two or three of the above marks need a word of explanation:
If a word or line, from any cause, is crooked, draw a line above and below, and two horizontal, parallel lines in the margin.
If a sentence or more than four words be left out, make a carat where the omission occurs, and on the margin write -- Out, -- see copy.
When the proof-reader doubts the correctness of a word, phrase or anything else, he encircles or underscores it, and in the margin writes Qr., with or without a suggested correction, encircled. Should the author adopt the suggestion, he draws a line across only the Qr., if he rejects it, he crosses also the correction. When the author, not having the copy at hand, suspects a deviation from copy, and wishes the copy literally followed, he encircles or underscores the doubtful word or phrase, and writes in the margin -- Qr., see copy.
I might perhaps extend these remarks, but it is impossible to mention every supposable correction that can be made, and I think any author, with the above example and remarks and the exercise of his own common sense, should be able to mark a proof intelligibly.
1. Taking the whole reach forward, and falling back gradually a little part the perpendicular, preserving the shoulders throughout square, and the chest developed at the end.
2. Catching the water and beginning the stroke with a full tension on the arms at the instant of contact.
3. A horizontal and dashing pull through the water immediately the blade is covered, without deepening in the space subsequently traversed.
4. Rapid recovery after feathering by an elastic motion of the body from the hips, the arms being thrown forward perfectly straight simultaneously with the body, and the forward motion each ceasing at the same time.
5. Lastly, equability in all the actions, preserving full strength without harsh, jerking, isolated and uncompensated movements in any single part of the frame.
The above laws are sinned against when the rower
1. Does not straighten both arms before him.
2. Keeps two convex wrists instead of the outside wrist flat.
3. Contrives to put his hands forward by a subsequent motion after the shoulders have attained their reach, which is getting the body forward without the arms.
4. Extends the arms without a corresponding bend on the part of the shoulders, which is getting the arms forward without the body.
5. Catches the water with unstraightened arms or arm, and a slackened tension as its consequence; thus time may be kept, but not stroke; keeping stroke always implying uniformity of work.
6. Hangs before dipping downwards to begin the stroke.
7. Does not cover the blade up to the shoulder.
8. Rows round and deep in the middle, with hands high and blade still sunken after the first contact.
9. Curves his back forward or aft.
10. Keeps one shoulder higher than the other.
11. Jerks.
12. Doubles forward and bends over the oar at the feather, bringing the body up to the handle and not the handle up to the body.
13. Strikes the water at an obtuse angle, or rows the first part in the air.
14. Cuts short the end, prematurely slackening the arms.
15. Shivers out the feather, commencing it too soon and bringing the blade into a plane with the water while work may yet be done; thus the oar leaves the water in perfect time, but stroke is not kept. This and No. 5 are the most subtle faults in rowing, and involve the science of shirking.
16. Rolls backward, with an inclination towards the inside or outside of the boat.
17. Turns his elbows at the feather instead of bringing them sharp past the flanks.
18. Keeps the head depressed between the shoulders instead of erect.
19. Looks out of the boat instead of straight before him. (This almost inevitably rolls the boat.)
20. Throws up the water instead of turning it well aft off the lower angle of the blade. A wave thus created is extremely annoying to the oar further aft; there should be no wave travelling astern, but an eddy containing two small circling swirls.
Stone is to be procured in some form in almost every part of the country, and a road made of small broken stone to the depth of 10 inches, will be smooth, solid, and durable.
The size of stones for a road should be about that of a hen's egg. It must be in due proportion to the space occupied by a wheel of ordinary dimensions on a smooth level surface, this point of contact will be found to be longitudinally, about 1 inch, and every piece of stone put into a road, which exceeds 1 inch in any of its dimensions, is mischievous.
In repairing an old road no addition of materials is to be brought upon it, unless in any part it be found that there is not a quantity of clean stone equal to 10 inches in thickness.
The stone already in the road is to be loosened up. The road is then to be laid as flat as possible, a rise of 3 inches from the centre to the side is sufficient for a road 30 feet wide.
The stones when loosened in the road are to be gathered off by means of a strong heavy rake to the side of the road, and there broken.
When the large stones have been removed, the road is to be put in shape, and a rake employed to smooth the surface.
When the road is so prepared, the stones that have been broken by the side of the road are then to be carefully spread on it -- not to be laid on it in shovelsful, but scattered over the surface, one shovelful following another, and spreading over a considerable space.
When additional stone is wanted on a road that has consolidated by use, the old hardened surface of the road is to be loosened with a pick, in order to make the fresh materials unite with the old.
Every road is to be made of broken stone, without mixture of earth, clay, chalk, or any other matter that will imbibe water and be affected with frost; nothing is to be laid on the clean stone on pretense of binding; broken stone will combine by its own angles into a smooth solid surface that cannot be affected by vicissitudes of weather, or displaced by the action of wheels, which will pass over without a jolt, and consequently without injury.
Flint makes an excellent road, if due attention be paid to the size, but; from want of that attention, many of the flint roads are rough, loose, and expensive.
Limestone, when properly prepared and applied, makes a smooth, solid road, and becomes consolidated sooner than any other material; but from its nature is not the most lasting.
When the frost begins to set in, cover the water-pipes with hay or straw bands, twisted tight round them. Let the cisterns and water-butts be washed out occasionally; this will keep the water pure and fresh.
In pumping up water into the cistern for the watercloset, be very particular, in winter time. Let all the water be let out of the pipe when done; but if this is forgotten, and it should be frozen, take a small gimblet and bore a hole in the pipe a little distance from the place where it is let off which will prevent its bursting. Put a peg into the hole when the water is let off.
Of very thin cedar, pine, or other soft wood make a box 5 or 6 inches deep, 7 or 8 inches wide, and of a length just equal to the width of the window in which it is to be placed. Across the top, near each end, glue a strip of wood half an inch high and a quarter of an inch thick, for bridges. Into the ends of the box insert wooden pins, like those of a violin, to wind the strings around, two pins in each end. Make a sound-hole in the middle of the top, and string the box with small cat gut, or blue first-fiddle strings. Fastening one end of each string to a metallic pin in one end of the box, and, carrying it over the bridges, wind it around the turning-pin in the opposite end of the box. The ends of the box should be increased in thickness where the wooden pins enter, by a piece of wood glued upon the inside. Tune the strings in unison and place the box in the window. It is better to have four strings, as described, but a harp with a single string produces an exceedingly sweet melody of notes, which vary with the force of the wind.
The common causes of smoky chimneys are either that the wind is too much let in above at the mouth of the shaft, or else that the smoke is stilled below. They may also proceed from there being too little room in the vent, particularly where several open into the same funnel. The situation of the house may likewise affect them, especially if backed by higher ground or higher buildings.
The best method of cure is to carry from the air a pipe under the floor and opening under the fire. Or, when higher objects are the cause, to fix a movable cowl at the top of the chimney.
In regard to smoky chimneys, a few facts and cautions may be useful; and a very simple remedy may often render the calling in of masons and bricklayers unnecessary.
Observe that a northern aspect often produces a smoky chimney.
A single chimney is apter to smoke than when it forms part of a stack.
Straight funnels seldom draw well.
Large fire-places are apt to smoke, particularly when the aperture of the funnel does not correspond in size. For this a temporary remedy may be found in opening a door or window -- a permanent cure by diminishing the lower aperture.
When a smoky chimney is so incorrigible as to require a constant admission of fresh air into the room, the best mode is to introduce a pipe, one of whose apertures shall be in the open air and the other under the grate; or openings may be made near the top of the apartment, if lofty, without any inconvenience even to persons sitting close by the fire.
This species of artificial ventilation will always be found necessary for comfort where gas is used internally, whether a fire is lighted or not.
Where a chimney only smokes when a fire is first lighted, this may be guarded against by allowing the fire to kindle gradually; or more promptly by laying any inflammable substance, such as shavings, on the top of the grate, the rapid combustion of which will warm the air in the chimney, and give it a tendency upwards, before any smoke is produced from the fire itself. If old stove-grates are apt to smoke, they may be improved by setting the stove further back. If that fails, contract the lower orifice.
In cottages, the shortness of the funnel or chimney may produce smoke; in which case the lower orifice must be contracted as small as possible by means of an upright register.
If a kitchen chimney overpowers that of the parlor, as is often the case in small houses, apply to each chimney a free admission of air, until the evil ceases.
When a chimney is filled with smoke, not of its own formation, but from the funnel next to it, an easy remedy offers, in covering each funnel with a conical top, or earthen crock, not cylindrical, but a frustum of a cone, by means of which the two openings are separated a few inches, and the cold air or the gust of wind no longer forces the smoke down with them.
If these remedies fail it will be generally found that the chimney only smokes when the wind is in a particular quarter, connected with the position of some higher building, or a hill, or a grove of trees. In such cases the common turncap, as made by tinmen and ironmongers, will generally be found fully adequate to the end proposed. A case has occurred of curing a smoky chimney exposed to the northwest wind, and commanded by a lofty building on the southeast, by the following contrivance.
A painted tin cap, of a conical form, was suspended by a ring and swivel, so as to swing over the mouth of the chimney-pot by means of an arched strap or bar of iron nailed on each side of the chimney. When a gust of wind laid this cap (which, from its resemblance in form and use to an umbrella, is called a paravent or wind-guard) close to the pot on one side, it opened a wider passage for the escape of the smoke on the opposite side, whichever way the wind came, while rain, hail, etc. were effectually prevented from descending the flue.
The top of each chimney should be furnished with a pot somewhat in the shape of a bell, underneath the centre of which should be fixed a pulley, with a chain of sufficient length for both ends to be fastened, when not in use, to nails or pins in the chimney, out of sight, but within reach from below. One or both of these ends should be adapted to the reception of a brush of an appropriate construction; and thus chimneys may be swept as often as desired, by servants, with very little additional trouble.
Shut the doors and windows, throw water on the fire in the grate, and then stop up the bottom of the chimney.
The gas produced by throwing a handful of flowers of sulphur on the burning coal, where a chimney is on fire, will immediately extinguish the flames.
Keep the paste or oil in a proper can or jar, that there may be no danger of upsetting when using it. Have two pieces of woollen cloth, one for rubbing it on, the other for rubbing it dry and polishing; also an old linen cloth to finish with and a piece of smooth soft cork to rub out the stain. Use a brush if the paste be hard. Always dust the table well before the oil or paste is put on; and, if it should be stained, rub it with a damp sponge, and then with a dry cloth. If the stain does not disappear, rub it well with a cork or a brush the way the wood grows; for if rubbed crossgrained it will be sure to scratch it. Be careful to keep the cork and brush free from dust and dirt. When the dust is cleaned off and the stains have been got out, put on the oil or paste, but not too much at a time; rub it well into the wood. If oil, be as quick as possible in rubbing it over the table, and then polish it with another woollen cloth. If wax, put a little bit on the woollen cloth, with the finger or a small stick; rub it well with this till the table has a high polish, then have another cloth to finish it with. Be very careful to have the edges of the table well cleaned, and the oil and wax well rubbed off.
The furniture which is not in constant use will not require to be oiled above once a week; it ought however, to be dusted every day and well rubbed. Tables which are used daily must be well rubbed every morning, and great care should be taken to remove all spots from them particularly ink. This can very easily be done if not left to dry long, by putting on a little salt of lemons with the finger.
When cleaning tables or chairs, be careful to remove them into the middle of the room, or at a distance from the wall. If the sideboard or side-table is fixed to the wall, be still more careful in cleaning it, and roll up the woollen cloth tight in the hand, and into a small compass.
If they should be hung so high that they cannot be conveniently reached, have a pair of steps to stand upon; but mind that they stand steady. Then take a piece of soft sponge, well washed and cleaned from everything gritty, just dip it into water and squeeze it out again, and then dip it into some spirit of wine. Rub it over the glass; dust it over with some powder blue, or whiting sifted through muslin, rub it lightly and quickly off again with a cloth, then take a clean cloth and rub it well again, and finish by rubbing it with a silk handkerchief.
If the glass be very large clean one half at a time, as otherwise the spirit of wine will dry before it can be rubbed off. If the frames are not varnished the greatest care is necessary to keep them quite dry, so as not to touch them with the sponge, as this will discolor or take off the gilding.
To clean the frames, take a little raw cotton in the state of wool, and rub the frames with it; this will take off all the dust and dirt without injuring the gilding. If the frames are well varnished rub them with spirit of wine, which will take out all spots and give them a fine polish. Varnished doors may be done in the same manner. Never use any cloth to frames, or drawings, or unvarnished oil-paintings, when cleaning and dusting them.
Procure a smooth board, free from knots, or one covered with leather. If the latter, melt a sufficient quantity of mutton-suet, and put it hot upon the leather with a piece of flannel; then take two pieces of soft Bath brick, and rub them one against the other over the leather till it is covered with the powder, which rub in until no grease comes through when a knife is passed over the leather, which may easily be known by the knife keeping its polish.
If only a plain board, rub the Bath brick 2 or 3 times over it; for if too much be put on at once it will make the blades of the knives look rough and scratched. Let the board be of a proper height, and set so that the person may be a little on the stoop while cleaning the knives. Take a knife in each hand, holding them back to back; stand opposite the middle of the board, lay the knives flat upon it, and do not bear too hard upon them; by this method it will be easier to clean two knives at a time than one, and they will be less liable to be broken, for good knives will snap when pressed on too heavily. Many will say that they cannot clean two knives at once, or that they can get through them faster one by one; but if they will only try it a few times in the way recommended, they will find it not only much more expeditious, but easier.
Be careful in keeping a good edge on the knives. Carving-knives in particular ought to be kept sharp, which may easily be done by taking one in each hand, back to back when cleaning, scarcely letting them touch the board when expanding the arms, but when drawing the hands together again bearing a little hard on the edge of the knives; this will give them both a good edge and a fine polish, and is much better than sharpening them with a steel.
The best way to clean steel forks is to fill a small barrel with fine gravel, brick-dust, or sand mixed with a little hay or moss; make it moderately damp, press it well down, and let it always be kept damp. By running the prongs of the steel forks a few times into this, all the stains on them will be removed. Then have a small stick, shaped like a knife, with leather round it, to polish between the prongs, having first carefully brushed off the dust from them as soon as they are taken out of the tub. A knife-board is often spoiled in cleaning forks upon it, and likewise the backs of the knives; to prevent this have a piece of old hat or leather put on the board where the forks and backs of the knives are cleaned.
Always turn the back of the knives towards the palm of the hand in wiping them, this will prevent all danger from cutting. In wiping the forks put the corner of the cloth between the prongs, to remove any dirt or dust that may not have been thoroughly brushed out; and if there should be silver ferules on the knives and forks, or silver handles, they must be rubbed with a piece of leather and plate powder, keeping the blades covered while the handles are cleaning.
Wipe the knives and forks as soon as possible after being used, as the longer they are left with grease and stains on them the harder they will be to clean; particularly if they have been used for acids, salads, tarts, etc., have then a jug of hot water ready to put them into as soon as done with, and wipe them as before directed.
In order to keep knives and forks in good condition when they are not in use, rub the steel part with a flannel dipped in oil, wipe the oil off after a few hours, as there is often water in it; or dust the blades and prongs with quicklime, finely powdered and kept in a muslin bag.
Have a wooden horse to put the clothes on, and a small cane to beat the dust out of them; also a board or table long enough for them to be put their whole length when brushing them. Have two brushes, one a hard bristle, the other soft; use the hardest for the great coats, and for the others when spotted with dirt. Fine cloth coats should never be brushed with too hard a brush, as this will take off the nap, and make them look bare in a little time. Be careful in the choice of the cane; do not have it too large, and be particular not to hit too hard. Be careful also not to hit the buttons, for it will scratch if not break them; therefore a small hand-whip is the best to beat with.
If a coat be wet and spotted with dirt, let it be quite dry before brushing it; then rub out the spots with the hands, taking care not to rumple it in so doing. If it want beating do it as before directed, then put the coat at its full length on a board; let the collar be towards the left hand and the brush in the right. Brush the back of the collar first, between the two shoulders next, and then the sleeves, etc., observing to brush the cloth the same way that the nap goes, which is towards the skirt of the coat. When both sides are properly done fold them together, then brush the inside, and last of all the collar.
Put a tablespoonful of spirits of hartshorn (aqua ammoniae) in a pint of water and wash the brush in it; it will very quickly make the brush clean as new. This is also an excellent method of cleansing or shampooing the hair.
First clean them thoroughly with soap and water and a little rotten-stone; then dry them by wiping and exposure at the fire. Now get some good copal varnish, mix with it some bronze powder, and apply with a brush to the denuded parts. After which set the tea-tray in an oven, at a heat of 212° or 300°, until the varnish is dry. Two coats will make it equal to new.
Clean silver with hot water, followed by a solution of equal parts of spirits of ammonia and spirits of turpentine; and after this, if necessary, prepared chalk, whiting, magnesia, or rouge.
Procure some soft straw or hay to pack them in, and, if they are to be sent a long way and are heavy, the hay or straw should be a little damp, which will prevent them slipping about. Let the largest and heaviest things be always put undermost in the box or hamper. Let there be plenty of straw, and pack the articles tight; but never attempt to pack up glass or China which is of much consequence, till it has been overlooked by some one used to the job. The expense will be but trifling to have a person to do it who understands it, and the loss may be great, if articles of such value are packed up in an improper manner.
The best material for cleaning either porcelain or glassware is fuller's earth, but it must be beaten into a fine powder and carefully cleared from all rough or hard particles, which might endanger the polish of the brilliant surface.
Cut some brown paper into very small bits, so as to go with ease into the decanters; then cut a few pieces of soap very small, and put some water, milk warm, into the decanters, upon the soap and paper; put in also a little pearlash. By well working this about in the decanters it will take off the crust of the wine and give the glass a fine polish. Where the decanters have been scratched, and the wine left to stand in them a long time, have a small cane, with a bit of sponge tied tight at one end; by putting this into the decanter any crust of the wine may be removed. When the decanters have been properly washed let them be thoroughly dried and turned down in a proper rack.
If the decanters have wine in them when put by, have some good corks always at hand to put in instead of stoppers; this will keep the wine much better.
Be careful not to shake or disturb the crust when moving it about or drawing the cork, particularly Port wine. Never decant wine without a wine-strainer, with some fine cambric in it to prevent the crust and bits of cork going into the decanter. In decanting Port wine do not drain it too near; there are generally two-thirds of a wineglass of thick dregs in each bottle, which ought not to be put in; but in white wine there is not much settling. Pour it out, however, slowly, and raise the bottle up gradually. The wine should never be decanted in a hurry; therefore always do it before the family sits down to dinner. Do not jostle the decanters against each other when moving them about, as they easily break when full.
Hats require great care or they will soon look shabby. Brush them with a soft camel-hair brush; this will keep the fur smooth. Have a stick for each hat to keep it in its proper shape, especially if the hat has got wet. Put the stick in as soon as the hat is taken off, and when dry put it into a hat-box, particularly if not in constant use, as the air and dust soon turn hats brown. If the hat is very wet, handle it as lightly as possible; wipe it dry with a cloth or silk handkerchief, then brush it with the soft brush. If the nap sticks so close, when almost dry, that it cannot be got loose with the soft brushes, then use the hard ones; but if the nap still sticks, damp it a little with a sponge dipped in beer or vinegar; then brush it with a hard brush till dry.
Good brushes and blacking are indispensably necessary. First remove all the loose dirt with a wooden knife, and never use a sharp steel one, as the leather is too often cut, and the boots and shoes spoiled. Then take the hard brush and brush off the remainder, and all the dust; they must also be quite dry before blacking, or they will not shine. Do not put on too much blacking at a time, for if it dries before using the shining brush the leather will look brown instead of black. If there are boot-trees, never clean boots or shoes without them, but take care that the trees are always kept clean and free from dust. Never put one shoe within another, and when cleaning ladies boots or shoes, be careful to have clean hands, that the linings may not get soiled. Always scrape off the dirt when wet from boots or shoes, but never place them too near the fire when dry, as that cracks the leather.
This is performed by means of cork, in the simplest manner, and with scarcely any expense. Bore 3 or 4 holes in the sides of the sash, into which insert common bottle-cork, projecting about the sixteenth part of an inch. These will press against the window frames along the usual groove, and by their elasticity support the sash at any height which may be required.
Always select one the figures of which are small, for in this case the two webs in which the carpeting consists, are always much closer interwoven than in carpets where large figures upon ample grounds are represented.
Use two kinds of clear starch in washing. For shirts and collars the pearl starch is preferred. It should be well boiled and smooth. To 1 qt. of starch put in a piece of spermaceti as large as a walnut, or dissolve a oz. of gum Arabic in 1 pint of water, and strain through a cloth; of this add a tablespoonful to each pint of starch. In bottling, a very little corrosive sublimate may be put with the gum to make it keep.
To strong lye of wood-ashes add enough copperas for the required oak shade. Put this on with a mop, and varnish afterwards.
Put them into water; if the butt ends turn up they are not fresh. This is said to be a certain test.
A writer says: The best method I know of to preserve eggs is to fill the pores of the shell with fresh, clean lard, so as to exclude all the air. It is my opinion that this simple and easy method is preferable to any now in use. Some put them in lime-water, some lay them down in salt, some put them in saw-dust. But the lime cooks them, so that they have a dried appearance; salt has a similar effect, while eggs saturated with lard (as far as my experience goes) open fresh and nice. In Paris, however, where they understand these things thoroughly, eggs are preserved by immersion in hot water, as follows: Water is made to boil in a kettle, a dozen eggs are put into a colander, which is plunged into the kettle, left there about a minute, and then withdrawn with the eggs. By this means a thin layer or yolk becomes coagulated, and forms in the interior surface of the shell a sort of coating, which opposes itself to the evaporation of the substance of the egg, and consequently to the contact of the air which rushes in to fill the void left by the evaporation.
The juice, having been expressed from the fruit, was strained and put into quart bottles; these having been carefully corked, were put into a pan of cold water, which was then by degrees raised to the boiling point. At that temperature it was kept for half an hour, and was then allowed to cool down to the temperature of the air. After being bottled for 8 months the juice was in the state of a whitish, turbid liquor, with the acidity and much of the flavor of the lime; nor did it appear to have undergone any alteration. Some of the juice, which had been examined the year before, and which had since only been again heated and carefully bottled, was still in good condition, retaining much of the flavor of the recent juice. Hence it appears that, by the application of the above process, the addition of rum or other spirit to lime or lemon-juice, may be avoided, without rendering it at all more liable to spontaneous alteration.
Provide bottles, which must be perfectly clean, sweet, and dry. Draw the milk from the cow into the bottles, and, as they are filled, immediately cork them well up, and fasten the corks with pack-thread or wire. Then spread a little straw on the bottom of a boiler, on which place the bottles with straw between them until the boiler contains a sufficient quantity. Fill it up with cold water, heat the water, and as soon as it begins to boil draw the fire, and let the whole gradually cool. When quite cold take out the bottles, and pack them with straw or saw-dust in hampers, and stow them in the coolest part of the house or ship. Milk preserved in this manner, although 18 months in the bottles, will be as sweet as when first milked from the cow.
Cut the cabbage so as to leave about 2 inches or more of the stem attached to it; after which scoop out the pith to about the depth of 1 inch, taking care not to wound or bruise the rind by the operation. Suspend the cabbage by means of a cord tied around the stem, so that that portion of it from which the pith is taken remains uppermost, which regularly fill every morning with fresh water. By this simple method cabbages, cauliflowers, broccoli, etc. may be preserved fresh during a long voyage, or in a severe winter, for domestic use.
One-third pt. of lemon-juice, 3/4 lb. white sugar, 1/4 pt. peach brandy, 1/2 pint cogniac brandy, 1/4 pt. Jamaica rum, no water, but a large lump of ice.
Put some lumps of quicklime into a bucket of cold water, and stir it about till dissolved and mixed, after which a brush with a large head, and a long handle, to reach the ceiling of the room, is used to spread it thinly on the walls, etc. When dry, it is beautifully white, but its known cheapness has induced the plasterers to substitute a mixture of glue size and whiting for the houses of their opulent customers; and this, when once used, precludes the employment of limewashing ever after, for the latter, when laid on whiting, becomes yellow.
Whitewashing is an admirable manner of rendering the dwellings of the poor clean and wholesome.
First. For rough outside walls -- those exposed to the weather -- the best mixture is clear lime and water. Any animal or vegetable substance added diminishes the adhesion and durability of the wash.
Second. But if the wall is hard and smooth, the wash is improved by a mixture of very fine sand -- as much as will mix and can be applied.
Third. For inside walls an addition of a little glue -- say 1/4 lb. to 3 pailfuls -- increases the adhesion. If it is desired to have the walls very white, the whites of eggs may be used in the place of the glue.
Soak the wick in strong vinegar, and dry it well before you use it; it will then burn both sweet and pleasant, and give much satisfaction for the trifling trouble in preparing it.
Put the meat into the water running from a spring. It will sink -- examine it daily -- when it begins to rise from the bottom it must be used; it will be found perfectly sound and tender, and may be boiled or roasted. Meat may be preserved in this manner 3 or 4 days in summer-time, free from taint. The outside will appear somewhat whitened, but the flavor is not injured. It would be advisable to have a box or tub, with a cover, into and out of which the water shall have free passage, which may be put either inside or outside of the spring-house.
When a crack is discovered in a stove, through which the fire or smoke penetrates, the aperture may be completely closed in a moment with a composition consisting of wood-ashes and common salt, made up into paste with a little water, and plastered over the crack. The good effect is equally certain, whether the stove, etc., be cold or hot.
After painting the figures, cut them out, so that none of the white of the paper remains, then take some thick gum Arabic water, pass it over all the figures, and place them on the inside of the glass to taste; let them stand to dry for 24 hours, then clean them well with a wet cloth betwixt the prints, and let them stand a few hours longer lest the water should move any of the edges, then take white wax and flake white, ground very fine, and melt them together; with a japanning-brush go over all the glass above the prints; done in this manner they will hold water; or, boil isinglass to a strong jelly, and mix it up with white lead, ground fine and lay it on in the same manner; or use nut-oil and flake-white. For a blue ground, do it with white wax and Prussian blue, ground fine; for red, wax and vermilion, or carmine; for green, wax and verdigris; for a chocolate color, wax and burnt umber.
Take of river sand, 3 parts; of seed-lac, washed, 1 part. Mix them over a fire in a pot, and form the mass into the shape of a grindstone, having a square hole in the centre; fix it on an axis with liquefied lac, heat the stone moderately, and by turning the axis it may easily be formed into an exact circular shape. Polishing grindstones are made only of such sand as will pass easily through fine muslin in the proportion of 2 parts of sand to 1 of lac. This sand is found at Ragimaul. It is composed of small angular crystalline particles tinged red with iron, 2 parts to 1 of black magnetic sand. The stone-cutters, instead of sand, use the powder of a very hard granite called corune. These grindstones cut very fast. When they want to increase their power they throw sand upon them, or let them occasionally touch the edge of a vitrified brick. The same composition is formed upon sticks for cutting stones, shells, etc., by the hand.
Place a dozen wicks on an iron circle, at equal distances, over a large copper vessel tinned and full of melted wax; pour a ladleful of the wax on the tops of the wicks, one after another; what the wick does not take will drop into the vessel, which must be kept warm by a pan of coals; continue this process till the candles are as large as required. If they are wanted of a pyramidal form, let the first three ladlesful be poured on at the top of the wick, the fourth at the height of three-quarters, the fifth at half, and the sixth at a quarter; then take them down hot, and lay them beside each other in a feather-bed folded in two to preserve their warmth and keep the wax soft; then take them down and roll them one by one on a smooth table, and cut off the thick end as required.
When peas, French beans, etc., do not boil easily, it has usually been imputed to the coolness of the season, or to the rains. This popular notion is erroneous. The difficulty of boiling them soft arises from an excess of gypsum imbibed during their growth. To correct this, throw a small quantity of carbonate of soda into the pot alone with the vegetables.
When there is any reason to fear that the hay which is intended to be housed or stacked is not sufficiently dry, let a few handfuls of common salt be scattered between each layer. This, by absorbing the humidity of the hay, not only prevents the fermentation, and consequent inflammation of it, but adds a taste to it, which stimulates the appetites of cattle and preserves them from many diseases.
In this instrument, two pens, and even three, if necessary, are joined to each other by slips of wood acting upon the pivot; one of these pens cannot move without drawing the other to follow all its movements; the rules are inflexible, and they preserve in all their positions the parallelism which is given by uniting them. The movements of one of these pens are identically the same as those of the other; the characters traced by the first are the exact counterpart of those which the second has formed; if the one rise above the paper and cease to write, or rather, if it make a scratch, or advance towards the ink-bottle, the other, faithful to the movements which are transmitted to it by the species of light wood which directs it, either rises or scratches or draws ink, and that without having occasion to give any particular attention to it. The copy is made of itself, and without ever thinking of it.
The polygraph is not expensive; it is used without difficulty, and almost with the same facility as in ordinary writing. The construction is as simple as it is convenient; all the parts are collected so as to be taken to pieces, and put up again very easily. Its size admits of its taking every desirable position, horizontal, perpendicular, or oblique, according to the application which is made of it, and the piece of furniture to which it is to be adapted, for it may be fixed to a drawer, a desk, an inkstand, an easel, or simply laid upon the table; it is generally accompanied by a drawer, and a case of the form and bulk of an ordinary desk.
Castor oil, besides being an excellent dressing for leather, renders it vermin-proof; it should be mixed, say half and half, with tallow or other oil. Neither rats, roaches, nor other vermin will attack leather so prepared.
A convenient substitute for a corkscrew, when the latter is not at hand, may be found in the use of a common screw, with an attached string to pull the cork.
Another. -- Stick two forks vertically into the cork on opposite sides, not too near the edge. Run the blade of a knife through the two, and give a twist.
Another. -- Fill the hollow at the bottom of the bottle with a handkerchief or towel; grasp the neck with one hand, and strike firmly and steadily with the other upon the handkerchief.
Any document written in cypher, by which signs are substituted for letters, or even for words, is liable to be decyphered. The following plans are free from such objection: The correspondents select two copies of the same edition of a book, the word to be used is designated by figures referring to the page, line, and number of the word in the line, or the message may be written on a slip of paper wound spirally around a rod of wood; these can only be decyphered by bringing them into their original position, by wrapping around a second rod of the same size. [For SYMPATHETIC INKS, see INKS.]
Every man, woman, and child has a property in life. What is the value of this property? Mr. Charles M. Willich has established an extremely easy rule for expressing this value -- this "Expectation of Life" at any age from 5 to 60. His formula stand thus: e = 2/3(80-a); or, in plain words, the expectation of life is equal to two-thirds of the difference between the age of the party and 80. Thus, say a man is now 20 years old, between that age and 80 there are 60 years; two-thirds of 60 are 40, and this is the sum of his expectation of life. If a man be now 60 years, he will have an expectation of life nearly 14 years more. By the same rule, a child of 5 has a lien of life for 50 years. Every one can apply the rule to his own age. Mr. Willich's hypothesis may be as easily remembered as that by De Moivre in the last century, which has now become obsolete, from the greater accuracy of the mortality tables. The results obtained by the new law correspond very closely with those from Dr. Farr's English Life-Table, constructed with great care from an immense mass of returns.
Five parts of rosin, 1 part of beeswax, 1 part of tallow. Melt these in a skillet, tin cup, or any metal vessel, the skillet being preferable, as it can be handled better, and the wax keeps warm longer in it. Mix these over the fire, and mix together well. When the scions are set -- say as many as 20 or 30, or as few as wished -- have the mixture ready and apply it warm with a small wooden paddle. See that every part is covered, and the air completely excluded. It requires no bandage. We have made the wax in different proportions to the above, but we find these to be best adapted to the purpose. The object to be attained is to have the wax of such consistency that it will not crack in the cold winds of March and April, nor run in the hot suns of summer.
All the smaller plants should be expanded under water, in a plate, upon a piece of writing-paper sunk to the bottom. In this state they will assume their natural form and position. The paper, with the plant upon it, must be withdrawn from the water gently; and the plant and paper afterwards placed betwixt two or three sheets of blottingpaper and pressed with a book or flat board. It is then to be laid up in a quire of blotting paper, under pressure, for a day or two, when, if dry, it may be placed permanently upon writing-paper.
Take clear rosin, dissolve it in a brass pan; to every ounce of which add 2 drs. of the finest vermilion: when stirred well together, choose the twigs and branches, peeled and dried, then take a pencil and paint the branches all over whilst the composition is warm; afterwards shape them in imitation of natural coral. This done, hold the branches over a gentle coal fire, till all is smooth and even as if polished. In the same manner white coral may be prepared with white-lead, and black coral with lampblack. A grotto may be built, with little expense, of glass, cinders, pebbles, pieces of large flint, shells, moss, stones, counterfeit coral, pieces of chalk, all bound or cemented together with the above described cement.
Draw off the stocking, just before undressing, and rub the ankles and feet with the hand as hard as can be borne for 5 or 10 minutes. This will diffuse a pleasurable glow, and those who do so will never have to complain of cold feet in bed. Frequent washing and rubbing them thoroughly dry with a linen cloth or flannel, is useful for the same purpose.
The common strawberry is a natural dentifrice, and its juice, without any preparation, dissolves the tartareous incrustations on the teeth, and makes the breath sweet and agreeable.
Dr. Schreber, of Leipzic, recommends the use of clay as the most "energetic, the most innocent, the most simple, and the most economical of palliative applications to surfaces yielding foul and moist discharges." He, moreover, considers that it has a specific action in accelerating the cure. Clay softened down in water, and freed from all gritty particles, is laid, layer by layer, over the affected part to the thickness of about a line. If it become dry and fall off, fresh layers are applied to the cleansed surface. The irritating secretion is rapidly absorbed by the clay, and the contact of air prevented. The cure thus goes on rapidly. This clay-ointment has a decisive action in cases of foetid perspiration of the feet or arm-pits. A single layer applied in the morning will destroy all odor in the day. It remains a long time supple, and the pieces which fall off in fine powder produce no inconvenience.
Avoid drinking water whilst warm, or drink only a small quantity at once, and let it remain a short time in the mouth before swallowing it, or wash the hands and face and rinse the mouth with cold water before drinking. If these precautions have been neglected, and the disorder incident to drinking cold water or eating ice when the body is heated, has been produced, the first and in most instances the only remedy to be administered is 60 drops of laudanum in spirits and water, or warm drink of any kind.
If this should fail of giving relief, the same quantity may be given 20 minutes afterwards.
When laudanum cannot be obtained, rum and water, brandy and water, or even warm water alone, should be given.
Whoever makes the attempt to abandon spirit-drinking, will find, from time to time, a rankling in the stomach, with a sensation of sinking, coldness and inexpressible anxiety. This may be relieved by taking often a cupful of an infusion of cloves made by steeping about an oz. of them in a pint of boiling water for 6 hours, and then straining off the liquor, or from a teaspoonful to a tablespoonful of elixir of valerianate of ammonia. In a state of permanent languor and debility, 1 1/2 oz. of the cascarilla bark (being also first bruised in a mortar), should be added to the infusion. This mixture taken in the quantity above specified 3 times a day will be found a useful strengthener of the stomach and bowels when they have been disordered by frequent excess and intoxication.
Take of aristolochia rotunda, or birthwort root, gentian root, tops and leaves, germander, tops and leaves, ground pine, tops and leaves, centuary, tops and leaves. Take of all these, well dried, powdered and sifted fine, equal weight; mix them well together, and take 1 dr. of this mixed powder every morning, fasting, in a cup of wine and water, broth, tea, or any other vehicle you like best; keep fasting 1 1/2 hours after it; continue this for 3 months without interruption, then diminish the dose to 3/4 dr. for 3 months longer, then to 1/2 dr. for 6 months more, taking it regularly every morning if possible; after the first year it will be sufficient to take 1/2 dr. every other day. As this medicine operates insensibly, it will perhaps take 2 years before you receive any great benefit, so you must not be discouraged, though you do not perceive at first any great amendment; it works slowly but surely; it does not confine the patient to any particular diet, so one lives soberly, and abstains from those meats and liquors that have always been accounted pernicious in the gout, as champagne, drams, high sauces, etc.
In rheumatism which is not habitual, a few of the drachm doses may do, but if habitual or of long duration, the powder must be taken as for the gout. The remedy requires patience, as it operates but slowly in both distempers.
Pradier's remedy for the gout was purchased by the Emperor Napoleon, pro bono publico, for #2500. Take of balm of Mecca, 6 dr.; red bark, 1 oz.; saffron, 1/2 oz.; sarsaparilla, 1 oz.; sage, 1 oz.; rectified spirit of wine, 3 lbs. Dissolve separately the balm of Mecca in 1/3 of the spirit of wine - macerate the rest of the substances in the remainder for 48 hours; filter, and mix the two liquors for use; the tincture obtained is mixed with twice or thrice the quantity of lime-water; the bottle must be shaken in order to mix the precipitate settled at the bottom by standing.
The following is the mode of applying the remedy: A poultice must be prepared of linseed meal, which must be of good consistency and spread very hot of the thickness of a finger on a napkin, so as completely to surround the part affected; if it be required for both legs, from the feet to the knees, it will take about 3 qts. of linseed meal. When the poultice is prepared, and as hot as the patient can bear it, about 2 oz. of the prepared liquor must be poured equally over the whole of the surface of each, without its being imbibed; the part affected is then to be wrapped up in it, and bound up with flannel and bandages to preserve the heat. The poultice is generally changed every 24 hours, sometimes at the end of twelve.
Take 1/2 lb. of newly-killed beef or fowl, chop it fine, add 1 1/8 lbs. of distilled water, with 4 drops of pure muriatic acid, and 34 to 67 grains of common salt, and stir well together. After an hour the whole is to be thrown on a conical hair-sieve, and the fluid allowed to flow through without any pressure. The first thick portions which pass through are to be returned to the sieve, until the fluid runs off quite clear. Half a lb. of distilled water is to be poured, in small portions at a time, on the flesh residue in the sieve. There will be obtained in this way about 1 lb. of fluid (cold extract of flesh), of a red color, and having a pleasant taste of soup. The invalid is allowed to take it cold, a cupful at a time, at pleasure. It must not be heated, as it becomes muddy by heat, and deposits a thick coagulum of albumen and coloring matter of blood. In soup prepared in the usual way by boiling, all those constituents of flesh are wanting which are necessary for the formation of blood albumen; and the yolk of egg, which is added, is poor in those substances, for it contains in all 82 1/2 per cent. of water and fat, and only 17 1/2 per cent. of a substance, the same or very similar to albumen of egg. But whether it is equal in its power of nutrition to the albumen of flesh, is at least doubtful from the experiments of Magendie. Besides the albumen of flesh, the new soup contains a certain quantity of coloring matter of blood, and with it a much larger quantity of the necessary iron for the formation of the blood-corpuscles, and finally, the muriatic acid to assist digestion. A great obstacle to the use of this soup in summer is its liability to change in warm weather. It enters into fermentation like sugar with yeast, but without acquiring a bad odor. What may be the substance which gives rise to this fermentation is a question well worthy of being investigated. The extraction of the flesh must consequently be made with very cold water, and in a cool place. Iced water, and external cooling with ice, completely removes this difficulty. But the most important point to be attended to is to employ meat quite recently killed, and not several days old. The soup has been successfully employed in low fevers and the summer-complaint of children.
With that remarkable estimation of the greatness of small things which is the most valuable of his many high intellectual qualities, and with a tender appreciation of the importance of small people, Baron Liebig devotes a special article in an English scientific periodical to the description of a new diet which he conceives to be the most fitting substitute for the natural nutriment of children robbed of their mother's milk. It is well known the cow's milk does not adequately represent the milk of a healthy woman, and when wheaten flour is added, as it commonly is, Liebig points out that, although that starch be not unfitting for the nourishment of infants, the change of it into sugar in the stomach during digestion imposes an unnecessary labor on the organization, which will he spared it if the starch be changed into the soluble forms of sugar and dextrine. This he effects by adding to the wheaten flour a certain quantity of malt. As wheaten flour and malt flour contain less alkali than woman's milk he supplies this when preparing the soup. This soup may be shortly prepared, as follows: "Half an oz. of wheaten flour and an equal quantity of malt flour; 7 1/2 grs. of bicarbonate of potash and 1 oz. of water are to be well mixed; 5 oz. of cow's milk are then to be added, and the whole put on a gentle fire; when the mixture begins to thicken it is removed from the fire, stirred during 5 minutes, heated and stirred again till it becomes fluid, and finally made to boil. After the separation of the bran by a sieve it is ready for use. By boiling it for a few minutes it loses all taste of the flour." The immediate inducement for Baron Liebig making this soup arose from the fact that one of his grandchildren could not be suckled by its mother, and that another required, besides his mother's milk, a more concentrated food. The soup proved an excellent food -- the children thrived on it. Baron Liebig has himself used this soup with tea as a breakfast, and a most thoroughly nutritious meal it must be. The temperature before boiling should not exceed 148° Fahr.
Let an iron pen be used, the point of which is not split. Blind persons writing without ink, and pressing on a strong paper, will produce characters in relief, which they can immediately read by passing their fingers over the projecting characters on the opposite side of the paper, in the contrary direction.
Let the hone be seldom and but sparingly resorted to, and never, unless by frequent and repeated stropping the edge of the razor is entirely destroyed; use the best pale oil, and be careful to preserve the hone clean and free from dust. Previously to the operation of shaving, it will be found of service, particularly to those who have a strong beard and a tender skin, to wash the face well with soap and water, and the more time is spent in lathering and moistening the beard, the easier will the process of shaving become. Dip the razor in hot water before applying it to the face; use the blade nearly flat, always taking care to give it a cutting instead of a scraping direction. Strop the razor immediately after using it for the purpose of effectually removing any moisture that may remain upon the edge, and be careful not to employ a common strop, as the composition with which they are covered is invariably of a very inferior quality, and injurious to a razor. The strop should always be of the best manufacture, and when the composition is worn off it will be found particularly useful to rub it over, lightly, with a little clean tallow, and then put upon it the top part of the snuff of a candle, which, being a fine power, will admirably supply the place of the best composition ever used for the purpose. Another excellent mode of renovating a razor-strop is by rubbing it will with pewter, and impregnating the leather with the finest metallic particles.
Take oxide of tin levigated, vulgarly termed prepared putty, 1 oz.; saturated solution of oxalic acid, a sufficient quantity to form a paste. This composition is to be rubbed over the strop, and when dry a little water may be added. The oxalic acid having a great attachment for iron, a little friction with this powder gives a fine edge to the razor.
Many remedies have been proposed for curing this bad habit, but a simple and effective one is to discard the common halter, and get a broad, strong leather strap to buckle around the neck for a few inches below the ears. A horse may pull at this but will soon give it up.
Creep or crawl with your face near the ground, and although the room be full of smoke to suffocation, yet near the floor the air is pure, and may be breathed with safety. The best escape from upper windows is a knotted rope, but if a leap is unavoidable, then a bed should be thrown out first, or beds be placed by those outside for the purpose
Throw the harness or saddles to which they may have been accustomed, over the backs of the horses in this predicament, and they will come out of the stable as tractably as usual.
People generally turn a horse's head to a bright light to esamine his eyes. You can know very little by this method what sort of an eye the horse has, unless it be a very defective one. You must examine the eye first, when the horse stands with his head to the manger. Look carefully at the pupil of the eye in a horse; it is of an oblong form; carry the size of the pupil in your mind, and turn the horse about, bring him to a bright light, and if in the bright light the pupil of the eye contracts and appears much smaller than it was in the darker light, then you may be sure the horse has a strong, good eye; but, provided the pupil remains nearly of the same size as it appeared in the darker light, the horse has a weak eye, therefore have nothing to do with him. There are contracting and dilating muscles in the eye, which will plainly show you in what state the eye is, whether it be a strong or a weak one.
Wood-pigeons are very easily caught in hard weather, particularly when snow is on the ground. You have but to sweep the snow on one side for about a dozen yards long and about 3 feet broad. Lag about 20 small eel-hooks, fastened by a peg into the ground, and with a small bean on each; be sure you put the point of the hook only through the top of the bean and the barb standing quite out on the side, otherwise if the hook be totally buried in the bean, when the bird struggles he will pull the hook out of his throat.
I think as good a way as any is to punch 2 or 3 holes in horse-beans with an iron bodkin, and then boil them in some common gin; many will be so drunk that they cannot fly up; others will perch on the adjacent trees; watch them, and you will see them tumble down.
If you have a large pond or lake frequented by wild fowl, in the shallow water, about 1 ft. deep, where you observe them feed, lay a few rabbit traps, with a few beans on the bridge of the trap, under the water. This is a sure method of catching them. Where the water is about 2 ft. deep, put a stick in about 1 foot above the water; cut a slit at the top of the stick; tie a strong piece of pack-thread round a brick-bat, or to a large stone; let the string, after having tied it round the stone, be about a foot longer; to the other end fasten a small eel-hook, baited with a piece of bullock's lights, sheep's paunch or a horse-bean; then about 3 or 4 in. from the brick-bat fasten a stick nearly as big as your little finger and about 4 in. long, tying the string with a single knot exactly to the centre of the stick, then place that part of the string which is between the brick-bat and the short stick into the notch at the top of the long stick which is stuck in the bottom of the pond. The short stick will prevent the weight of the brick-bat from drawing the string through the notch, and the hook will hang a few inches from the water and the brick-bat hang fast by the notch in the top of the stick. When the water-fowl takes the baited hook he pulls the stick and the brickbat, and the latter pulls him under water and drowns him.
If the spectator is enable to swim, and can make the sufferer hear, he ought to direct him to keep his hands and arms under water until assistance comes; in the mean time throw towards him a rope, a pole, or any thing that may help to bring him ashore, or on board; he will eagerly seize whatever is placed within his reach; thus he may, perhaps, be rescued from his perilous situation.
But this desirable object appears attainable by the proper use of a man's hat and pocket handkercheif, which, being all the apparatus necessary, is to be used thus: Spread the handkerchief on the ground, or deck, and place a stiff hat, with the brim downwards, on the middle of it; then tie the handkercheif round the hat, like a bundle, keeping the knots as near the centre of the crown as possible. Now, by seizing the knots in one hand, and keeping the opening of the hat upwards, a person without knowing how to swim, may fearlessly plunge into the water, with whatever may be necessary to save the life of a fellow creature.
The best manner in which an expert swimmer can lay hold of a person he wishes to save from sinking, is to grasp his arm firmly between the shoulder and the elbow; this will prevent him from clasping the swimmer in his arms, and thus forcing him under water, and, perhaps, causing him to sink with him.
Sound travels at the rate of 1120 feet per second. Count the number of seconds between the flash and the thunder, and multiply by 1120. By this means the distance of a cannon or blast of rocks may also be estimated. The pulse of a healthy adult beats about 70 times a minute.
When persons happen to be overtaken by a thunderstorm, although they may not be terrified by the lightning, yet they naturally wish for shelter from the rain which usually attends it; and, therefore, if no house be at hand, generally take refuge under the nearest tree they can find. But in doing this, they unknowingly expose themselves to a double danger; first, because their clothes being thus kept dry, their bodies are rendered more liable to injury -- the lightning often passing harmless over a body whose surface is wet; and secondly, because a tree, or any elevated object, instead of warding off, serves to attract and conduct the lightning, which, in its passage to the ground, frequently rends the trunks or branches, and kills any person or animal who happens to be close to it at the time. Instead of seeking protection, then, by retiring under the shelter of a tree, hay-stack, pillar, wall, or hedge, the person should either pursue his way to the nearest house, or get to a part of the road or field which has no high object that can draw the lightning towards it, and remain there until the storm has subsided.
It is particularly dangerous to stand near leaden spouts, iron gates, or palisades, at such times; metals of all kinds having so strong an attraction for lightning, as frequently to draw it out of the course which it would otherwise have taken.
When in a house, avoid sitting or standing near the window, door, or walls, during a thunderstorm. The nearer a person is to the middle of a room the better.
In our attempts to recover those who have suffered under the calamities of famine, great circumspection is required. Warmth, cordials, and food, are the means to be employed: but it is evident that these may prove too powerful in their operation, if not administered with caution and judgment. For the body, by long fasting, is reduced to a state of more than infantile debility; the minuter vessels of the brain, and of the other organs, collapse for want of food to distend them; the stomach and intestines shrink in their capacity; and the heart languidly vibrates, having scarcely sufficient energy to propel the scanty current of blood. Under such circumstances a proper application of heat seems an essential measure, and may be effected, by placing on each side, a healthy man in contact with the patient. Pediluvia, or fomentation of the feet, may also be used with advantage.
The temperature of these should be lower than that of the human body, and gradually increased according to the effects of their stimulus. New milk, weak broth, or watergruel, ought to be employed, both for the one and the other; as nourishment may be conveyed into the system this way, by passages, properly the most pervious in a state of fasting, if not too long protracted.
It appears safer to advise the administration of cordials in very small doses, and, at first, considerably diluted with either wine or spirits, but slender wine whey will very well answer this purpose, and afford, at the same time, an easy and pleasant nourishment. When the stomach has been a little strengthened, an egg may be mixed with the whey, or administered under some other agreeable form. The yolk of one was, to Cornaro, sufficient for a meal, and the narrative of that noble Venetian, in whom a fever was excited by the addition of only two ounces of food to his daily allowance, shows, that the return to a full diet should be conducted with great caution, and by very slow gradations.
Cut your cheese into small slips, if soft; if hard, grate it down. Have ready a spirit-of-wine lamp, etc., and deep block-tin dish; put in the cheese with a lump of butter, and set it over the lamp. Have ready the yolk of an egg whipped, with half a glass of Madeira, and as much ale or beer; stir your cheese when melted, till it is thoroughly mixed with the butter, then add gradually the egg and wine; keep stirring till it forms a smooth mass. Season with Cayenne and grated nutmeg. To be eaten with a thin hot toast.
It often happens that in travelling, the materials for a rabbit may be had when there is nothing else in the house the gourmand can eat. In this case, if there is no blazer, or chafing dish, an excellent substitute is formed in a moment by two soup plates, separated from each other by pieces of a bottle-cork placed on the rim of the lower one, which should contain any kind of spirits. Put your cheese into the top one, fire the spirits with a slip of paper, and set your rabbit on the corks; it answers as well as the most expensive heater in Christendom.
Is the term applied by Professor Graham to a process devised by him for separating bodies by taking advantage of their tendency to form crystals or to remain in the amorphous or glue-like condition.
It is well known that many bodies have a tendency to crystallize, such as salt, sugar and alum; others, as albumen (white of egg), glue and the like are never known to assume the crystalline form. Professor Graham has found that if a mixture of the former, which he terms crystalloids, with the latter (colloids), be placed in a vessel having its sides or bottom constructed of animal membrane or parchment paper (page 436) and floated or immersed in water, the crystalloid will pass through into the surrounding liquid, while the eolloid will remain. This is not an action analogous to ordinary filtration, for the membrane is water-proof, but is of a more complex nature.
The dialyzer of Professor Graham consists of a hoop of wood having its bottom made of parchment-paper; it resembles, in fact, an ordinary tambourine. This is floated on the surface of a liquid and the mixture is poured into it. After a time the liquid gives on evaporation the crystalloid; salt, for instance, while the colloid, jelly, for instance, remains within the dialyzer.
Among the results of investigation with this apparatus have been the discovery of silica (sand, rock-crystal) in a soluble form (page 434) and the separation of crystalline poisons from organic matters in the stomach after death; many others will be found in the recent scientific journals.
Mr. A. Whitelaw has proposed to use the process of dialysis for obtaining the large amount of nutritious matter which exists in the brine of salted meats, and which is usually thrown away. According to Mr. W., 2 galls. of brine yield 1 lb. of solid extract, which makes a palatable and nutritious soup. It is only necessary to enclose the brine in bags of animal membrane, and immerse them in water; the salt passes through, and the albuminous and extractive matters remain.
Another application of dialysis is that of rendering salt meat more juicy, tender and digestible. The meat is placed in a bag of untanned skin, which is nearly filled with brine from the beef-barrel. This is placed in sea-water for several days, when the brine, having lost its salt by dialysis, becomes reduced in strength to that of sea-water. The beef, which had been contracted by the action of the salt, gives up its salt to the brine in the bag, swells and absorbs part of the juice which it had given out to the brine. In this way no loss is sustained by steeping, and the brine left in the bags, after a nightly dialysis, may be used for soup.
Thoroughly salted meat without bone gradually takes up nearly 1/3 of its weight of juices from the brine. It becomes then somewhat like fresh meat, and may be cooked in a variety of ways which are inadmissible for salt meat.
The body of the rider is divided into three parts, of which two are movable and one immovable; one of the first consists of all the upper part of the body down to the waist, the other of the lower part of the legs, from the knee down; the immovable portion is from the waist to the knees. The rider should sit square on the middle of the saddle, the upper part of the body presenting a free and unconstrained appearance, the chest not much thrown forward, the ribs resting freely on the hips, the waist and loins not stiffened, and thus not exposed to tension or effort from the motions of the horse; the upper part of the body should lean slightly to the rear, rather than forward; the thighs, inclining a little forward, lie flat and firmly an the saddle, covering the surcingle, of which only a small part behind the knee, should be seen; the lower part of the leg, hanging vertically from the knees, touches the horse, but without the slightest pressure; the toes are pointed up without constraint, and on the same line with the knees, for if the toes are turned outward it not only causes the horse to be unnecessarily pricked by the spurs (if worn), but the firmness of the seat is lost; the heels should be seven-eighths of an inch below the toes and the stirrups so adjusted that when the rider raises himself on them, there may be the breadth of 4 fingers between the crotch and the saddle; to make this adjustment, when the rider has acquired a firm and correct seat he should, without changing that seat, push the bottom of the stirrup to the hollow of the foot, and then, with the foot horizontal, feel a slight support from the stirrup; when this is accomplished he replaces the foot properly in the stirrup, and the heel will then be seven-eighths of an inch below the toes.
To give the rider a correct seat, the instructor, having caused him to mount, seizes the lower part of his leg, and stretches it straight toward the fore-quarters of the horse, so as to bring the buttocks of the rider square on the saddle; then, resting one hand on the man's knee, he seizes the lower part of the leg with the other, and carries back the thigh and knee so as to bring the crotch square on the saddle, the thighs covering the surcingle, the lower part of the leg, from the knee down, also over the surcingle, and sees that the rider does not sit too much on his crotch, but has his buttocks well under him. He then explains to the rider that the firmness of the seat consists in this: that the rider grasps the horse with his legs; that both thighs press equally upon the saddle, in conformity with the movements of the body, and that the general movements of the body and thighs must conform to those of the horse. He should be taught, too, how to hold the feet, without allowing him to place them in the stirrups, for this is one of the most essential conditions for a good seat.
Take two deep dishes, and sift 3/4 of a pound of flour into each. Make a hole in the centre of one of them, and pour in a wineglassful of the best brewer's yeast; mix the flour gradually into it, wetting it with lukewarm water; cover it, and set it by the fire to raise for two hours. In the meantime, cut up 5 oz. of butter into the other dish of flour, and rub it fine with your hands; add 1/2 lb. of powdered sugar, a teaspoonful of powdered cinnamon, a grated nutmeg, a tablespoonful of rosewater, and 1/2 pint of milk. Beat 3 eggs very light, and stir them hard into the mixture. Then, when the sponge is perfectly light, add it to the other ingredients, mixing them all thoroughly with a knife. Cover it, and set it by the fire for another hour. When it is quite light, flour your paste-board, turn out the lump of dough, and cut it into thick diamond or round shape cakes. If you find the dough so soft as to be unmanagable, mix in a little more flour. Have ready a skillet of boiling lard, put the dough nuts into it, and fry them brown.
One and a half lbs. of flour, 5 eggs, 3/4 of a lb. of sugar, 6 oz. of butter, 1 teaspoonful of cinnamon and nutmeg mixed, 1 wineglassful of rosewater, 1 tablespoonful of saleratus. Rub the butter, sugar, and flour together, add the spice, rosewater, and saleratus. Beat the eggs very light, mix all into a dough, knead it well, and roll it out an inch thick. Cut it into slips, twist them into various forms, fry in hot lard until they are of a light brown. When cold, sift sugar over them.
Gather the leaves of the hundred-leaved rose (rosa centifolia), put them in a large jar or cask, with just sufficient water to cover them; then put the vessel to stand in the sun and in about a week afterward the otto (a butyraceous oil) will form a scum on the surface, which should be removed by the aid of a piece of cotton.
Draw the fish and remove the gills, then insert a piece of charcoal in their mouths, and two or three pieces in their bellies. If they are to be conveyed any distance, wrap each fish separately in paper and place them in a box. Fish thus preserved will keep fresh for several days.
Dissolve 10 parts clear grains of mastic, 5 parts camphor, 15 grs. sandarac, and 5 parts elemi, in a sufficient quantity of alcohol, and apply this varnish without heat. The articles will not only be preserved from rust, but the varnish will retain its transparency, and the metallic brilliancy of the articles will not be impaired.
Keep an oyster-shell in the bottom of the kettle, this will prevent the iron from rusting and keep the water clear.
Wash first in warm soap-suds and rinse them in warm water, having the water neither too hot nor too cold.
These are little cones of sulphocyanide of mercury, which, when lighted, give forth a long, serpent-like, yellowish-brown body.
Prepare nitrate of mercury by dissolving red precipitate in strong nitric acid as long as it is taken up. Prepare also sulphocyanide of ammonium by mixing one volume of bisulphide of carbon, four of strong solution of ammonia, and four of alcohol. This mixture is to be frequently shaken. In the course of about 2 hours the bisulphide will have dissolved, forming a deep red solution. Boil this until the red color disappears and the solution becomes of a light yellow color. This is to be evaporated at about 80° Fahr. until it crystallizes. Add little by little the sulphocyanide to the mercury solution. The sulphocyanide of mercury will precipitate; the supernatant liquid may be poured off, and the mass made into cones about half an inch in height. The powder of the sulphocyanide is very irritating to the air passages, and the vapors from the burning cones should be avoided as much as possible. To ignite, set them on a plate or the like, and light them at the apex of the cone. The result is certainly most remarkable; the fiery vapors, winding and twisting in the strangest fashion, render them objects of curiosity and astonishment to all who witness their performance.
Or the Art of Ornamenting China, Glass, Earthenware, Woodenware, Fancy Boxes, Ivory, and Paper Mache Goods, Japannedware, Binding of Books, Fans, Leather Work, etc., etc.
Directions. - Cover the picture entirely (taking care not to go beyond the outlines) with a slight coat of fixing varnish, then put the picture on the object to be ornamented, being careful to place it properly at once, in order not to spoil it by moving. The varnish newly applied being too liquid, the picture should be left to dry eight or ten minutes, and placed on the object to be ornamented, when just damp enough to be still adherent: this done, cover the back of the picture with a piece of cloth steeped in water; then, by means of a knife or pen-holder, rub it all over, so as to fix every part of it; then remove the piece of cloth and rinse the paper with a paint-brush steeped in water; at the end of a few minutes the paper will come off, leaving the painting transferred.
Care must be taken that the piece of cloth, without being too wet, should be sufficiently so for the paper to be entirely saturated. The picture must now be washed with a wet paint-brush, and dried very lightly with some blotting paper. The ornamented article should, after this, be put near the stove or any other warm place, to make it dry well and to improve the adhesiveness of the pictures. The polishing varnish should not be applied until the next day, keeping the pictures in the meantime carefully out of the dust. The latter varnish should be put on as lightly as possible.
If dark-colored objects are to be ornamented, such as bindings of books, Russian leather, leather bags, etc., the picture must first be covered with a mixture of white lead and turpentine, following the outlines of the design and covering it entirely. When this coat is perfectly dry, proceed according to the above instructions.
To print on silk, paper, or materials that cannot bear washing after the process, proceed as follows: Cover the picture entirely with a light coat of fixing varnish and let it dry for an hour or two; then pass a sponge, lightly damped, over the whole surface of the paper, in order to take away the composition which is on it in the blank parts and which often cleans the material.
When the paper is dry, re-varnish the picture, and transfer it on to the material by means of a paper cutter, avoiding to employ the piece of cloth or anything damp; then, with a paint-brush slightly steeped in water, wet the paper lightly and leave it a full quarter of an hour on the object before removing it.
To remove a spoiled print, rub it with a soft rag imbibed in turpentine.
Our readers will at once appreciate the merits of this invention; the facility with which it can be applied, also its numerous applications.
Mix glycerine with water, together with a small quantity of alcohol, add Cologne, or other perfume, and you have a preparation closely resembling the celebrated Email de Paris. This preperation is said to impart a soft, white, and elegant skin of the texture and color of polished ivory, and to remove all discolorations, black worm specks, and roughness of the skin, and smooths out the marks of smallpox.
Take 2 parts (in bulk) of water-lime ground fine, 1 part (in bulk) of white lead ground in oil. Mix them thoroughly, by adding best boiled linseed-oil enough to prepare it to pass through a paint-mill, after which temper with oil till it can be applied with a common paint-brush. Make any color to suit. It will last three times as long as lead paint, is superior, and cost not one-fourth as much.
Many have heard of the brilliant stucco whitewash on the east end of the President's house at Washington. The following is a receipt for it:
Take 1/2 bushel nice unslaked lime, slake it with boiling water, cover it during the process to keep in the steam. Strain the liquid through a fine sieve or strainer, and add to it a peck of salt, previously well dissolved in warm water, 3 lbs. ground rice, boiled to a thin paste, and stirred in boiling hot, 1/2 lb. powdered Spanish whiting, and 1 lb. of clean glue, which has been previously dissolved by soaking it well, and then hang it over a slow fire, in a small kettle within a large one filled with water. Add 5 galls. of hot water to the mixture, stir it well, and let it stand a few days, covered from the dirt. It should be put on right hot: for this purpose, it can be kept in a kettle on a portable furnace. It is said that about a pint of this mixture will cover a square yard upon the outside of a house, if properly applied. Brushes more or less may he used, according to the neatness of the job required. It answers as well as oil-paint for wood, brick, or stone, and is cheaper. It retains its brilliancy for many years. There is nothing of the kind that will compare with it, either for inside or outside walls. Coloring-matter may be put in, and made of any shade you like. Spanish-brown stirred in will make red pink, more or less deep, according to the quantity. A delicate tinge of this is very pretty for inside walls. Finely pulverized common clay, well mixed with Spanish-brown, makes a reddish stone-color. Yellow ochre stirred in makes yellowwash; but crome goes further, and makes a color generally esteemed prettier. In all these cases the darkness of the shades, of course, is determined by the quantity of coloring used. It is difficult to make rules, because tastes are different; it would be best to try experiments on a shingle, and let it dry. Green must not be mixed with lime; it destroys the color, and the color has an effect on the whitewash which makes it crack and peel. When walls have been badly smoked, and you wish to have them a clean white, it is well to squeeze indigo plentifully through a bag into the water you use, before it is stirred in the whole mixture, or add a little blue stone. If a larger quantity than 5 galls. be wanted, the same proportion should be observed.
It has been recently announced that a plan has been discovered by which gunpowder may be rendered non-explosive at pleasure, and afterwards restored to its former condition of combustibility. This remarkable discovery was lately announced to have been made in England, but it seemed so improbable that little attention was paid to it. By experiments made during October of this your (1865), at Jersey City, New Jersey, under the charge of Mr. Handel Cossham, one of the party of English railway capitalists accompanying Sir Morton Peto to this country, the matter has been clearly demonstrated to be possible. At this experiment, common gunpowder was first exploded in the ordinary manner. Ground glass was then mixed with it, in proportion of two parts of gunpowder to one of ground glass. This mixture then refused to explode under the stimulation of red-hot pokers, matches, fuses, and lighted paper. It took fire and burned slowly, but it would not explode. After these tests the remains of the same powder were sifted, and the glass cleared from it, when, at the slightest touch of a match, the whole compound went off at a flash. But the most remarkable of the experiments was the placing of a four-pound keg of prepared gunpowder on the top of a small portable furnace, in full process of ignition. Under ordinary circumstances, such an attempt would have produced a terrible explosion; but here in a very few minutes it was seen to be perfectly harmless. The hoops of the keg soon fell apart and the powder dropped in the fire, almost extinguishing it.
The addition of ground glass has no chemical effect, but it acts mechanically. The glass separates the grains of powder, and prevents continuous combustion. Each grain is consumed by itself, and does not communicate sufficient force to its neighbor to render the latter dangerous. Mixed in heavier proportions, the gunpowder will scarcely burn; and by uniting four parts of ground glass with one of gunpowder, the latter is rendered as incombustible as a stone.
The importance of this discovery can scarcely be estimated. It is one of the greatest safeguards of human life ever discovered. It will render the powder magazine harmless, and prevent those frequent and terrible events resulting in the loss of life, which have sent misery and woe through many communities. This discovery was made by Mr. James Gale, of Plymouth, England, a blind man, who, in happier days, ere vision was denied him, had been extensively engaged in scientific pursuits.
A small quantity of nitric ether ("sweet spirits of nitre") mixed with the crude oil, carries off all the disagreeable odor of rancidity, whilst by subsequent warming the oil so treated, the spirituous ingredient is removed and the oil becomes sweet and limpid. A few drops of nitric ether added to a bottle of oil when first opened serves as a constant preventive to rancidity.
Fatty bodies in a globular state may be kept a long time without becoming rancid. This peculiar state can be imparted to fatty matters by melting them at 130° Fahr. and adding a small quantity of yolk of egg, or bile, or albuminous substances, or best, a solution of alkali, composed of 5 to 10 parts for every 100 of oil, at the same temperature. The whole is then agitated for some time to bring the fatty matter into a globular condition.
At a sitting of the Academy of Sciences at Paris, December 4, 1865, it was announced that a very valuable hydraulic cement may be obtained by heating dolomite, commonly known as "magnesian limestone," to between 575° and 750° Fahr. Or below a dull redness, powdering the calcined mass, and making it into a paste with water. This forms under water a stone of extraordinary hardness, which, when once set, is not affected in the slightest degree either by fresh or sea-water. He also found that a mixture of magnesia with powdered chalk or marble-dust forms with water a plastic mass, which, by exposure in water for some time, becomes converted into a kind of extremely hard artificial marble.
The clay is first well dried and then rendered plastic by admixture with glycerine. It retains its plasticity for months, and is capable of being used over and over again just like wax, with the advantage of always retaining the same consistence of plasticity, being neither hardened by cold nor softened by heat.
Another. - A cheaper method than the above, available for modelling and luting, is to make a mixture of pipe-clay with a solution of chloride of calcium of the specific gravity of 1.35. This retains its plasticity for more than a year, and makes a capital luting.
Possessing a very high degree of actinic power, has been discovered by M. Sayes, of Paris. It is produced by the combustion of a mixture of 24 parts of well-dried and pulverized nitre with 7 parts of flour of sulphur and 6 of realgar. This mixture does not cost more than 10 cents per pound, and its light is therefore cheaper than the magnesium, to which it is only very slightly deficient in actinic energy. It is not, however, suitable for in-door photography.
Paraffin is melted with 5 per cent. of linseed-oil and run into cakes for use. When needed it is melted, and the mixture spread with a brush over the cloth, leather, stone, iron, etc.
The above is also used as a good insulator for electric telegraph wires.
Mix 1 part of casein, or curds of milk, with 6 parts of calcined magnesia and 1 part of oxide of zinc, and a sufficient quantity of water to form a pasty mass, which is left to solidify, and when dry it is extremely hard, susceptible of receiving a high polish, and is sold as a substitute for meerschaum
Plunge the article in this solution: Hyposulphite of soda, 1 lb.; sal-ammoniac, 8 oz..; solution of ammonia, 4 oz.; cyanide of potassium, 4 oz. Let it remain 1/2 hour, wash, and rub with buckskin. The cyanide of potassium is very poisonous. It may be omitted, but then the solution is not so active. No powder is necessary in polishing.
| Wheat, | broadcast, | . . . | 1 3/4 to 2 | bushels. |
| " | drilled, | . . . | 1 1/2 | " |
| Rye, | broadcast, | . . . | 1 3/4 | " |
| " | drilled, | . . . | 1 1/2 to 1 3/4 | " |
| Barley, | broadcast, | . . . | 2 to 2 1/2 | " |
| " | drilled, | . . . | 1 3/4 to 2 | " |
| Oats, | broadcast, | . . . | 2 to 3 | " |
| " | drilled, | . . . | 2 | " |
| Timothy | { | When sown with grain in autumn, to be followed by clover in spring. | } | 1 1/2 to 2 galls. |
| Red Clover, | { | Sown on grain in spring in connection with Timothy (without Timothy double quantity). | } | 1 1/2 to 2 galls. |
| Herbs, or Red Top, | . . . | 1 to 1 1/2 bushels of 14 lbs. |
| Kentucky Blue Grass, | . . . | 1 to 1 1/2 bushels of 14 lbs. |
| Lucerne, drilled, | . . . | 10 lbs. |
| Dutch White Clover, broadcast, | . . . | 8 lbs. |
| Dutch White Clover, drilled, | . . . | 6 lbs. |
| Lawn Grass, | . . . | 2 to 2 1/2 bushels of 15 |
| Millet, | . . . | 3/4 to 1 bushel. |
| Corn, in hills, | . . . | 1 to 1 1/2 gallons. |
| Sorghum, or Chinese sugar cane, | . . . | 2 to 3 quarts. |
| Buckwheat, | . . . | 1 bushel. |
| Beets and Mangel-Wurzel, | . . . | 4 to 6 lbs. |
| Carrots, | . . . | 2 to 3 lbs. |
| Turnips and Ruta Baga, | . . . | 1 lb. |
| Parsnips, | . . . | 4 to 6 lbs. |
| Beans, in drills, 2 1/2 feet apart, | . . . | 1 1/2 bushels. |
| Potatoes, | . . . | 12 bushels. |
The following comprehensive article on the Cattle Disease has been prepared from the best English authorities on the subject, by a prominent physician of Philadelphia.
The wide-spread interest at present felt in the serious disorder which is now prevailing in England and other parts of Europe, under the name of the "Cattle Plague," and which it may justly be feared is destined also to afflict the United States, renders it desirable to furnish, in a condensed and popular form, such information as can be relied on, as the result of the studies of scientific men.
In 1865, a most valuable treatise "On the Cattle Plague; or, the Contagious Typhus of Horned Cattle, its History, Origin, Description, etc.," was published by H. Bourguignon, Doctor of the Faculty of Paris, etc., etc. From it much of the following account has been condensed.
The duration of the cattle plague, when it passes through all its phases, up to the death of the animal, consists of from ten to twelve days. In this time there are usually four stages, each of these averaging three or four days.
First. A period of incubation, during which the blood and humors of the animal are poisoned by noxious exhalations, and undergo important changes. Second. A febrile stage. Third. A revulsion, inducing stupor. Fourth. Characterized by free discharges from all the mucous membranes, as the nostrils, lungs, bowels, etc., ending in extreme prostration and death.
This typhus is a virulent, contagious, febrile, and non-recurring disease, to regulate which, it is all-important that every means should be employed to prevent its extension, not only to animals, but also to man, especially those who, having a slight sore or abrasion of the skin, come in contact with the diseased animals.
Various measures have been taken in England to prevent the spread of the contagion, among the most prominent of which is "the removal and destruction by burning or burying of all matters capable of reproducing the disease, " hence all articles which have been in contact with a diseased animal or any of its discharges, especially its dung, must be regarded as "infectious." Animals diseased had better be at once killed and deeply buried. In order to maintain or restore the health of cattle, there should be furnished abundance of pure air, dry, clean, well ventilated sheds, plenty of pure water, clean and dry meadows or pasture, frequent currying and washing of the skin, proper food at proper intervals, protection from inclement weather, the utmost cleanliness in the removal of manure, with its storage at a great distance from the cattle shed.
It is highly important to be able to recognize the "ox typhus fever," that the necessary measures may be taken to prevent contagion, and that the proper treatment may be pursued.
Symptoms. - When the contagious typhus is raging, keep a watchful eye on your cattle. If you notice in their gait, their looks, or about their ears, any unusual signs; if they seem less eager, less active, less vigilant; if they leave part of their food when in the stables, or if, when in the fields, they no longer browse with continued alacrity, - be upon your guard. If to these changes of minor importance is added an appetite really less acute, if the rumination is less regular, if the animal looks sad and dispirited, if he exhibits an unwonted look of gloom, if his leaden eye seems fixed and astonished, be assured that this cruel distemper is spreading through his frame.
By-and-by the animal loses his appetite more and more, rumination is shorter and less frequent. He holds his head down, his ears sink and fall, and he grinds his teeth. Then, as to the cows, their milk, which was already diminished, suddenly dries up altogether, and the lowness of spirits which had been visible for some days before, passes into stupor. If at this time you touch their horns, their extremities, or their hide in any part, you will find that all these different parts are sometimes warm and sometimes cold. From this-day forward you will witness a succession of disorders, such as shiverings at the attachments of the fore and hind legs, loud, panting breathing, with slight cough, scanty and thick urine, with hard and constipated droppings, and finally generally excessive warmth. If the back is now pressed, it will cause pain, and all the signs of intense fever will be manifest.
Already these indications have divulged the nature of the malady you have to deal with, but others more significant succeed them, and will remove every doubt.
The breathing now becomes more hurried and oppressed, and more puffy; from the eyes, nostrils, and mouth there issues a discharge which is at first thin and irritating, but soon becomes thick and purulent, and of a fetid smell; diarrhea takes the place of constipation; the cattle grow leaner, and some will die at this period: if they still hold out, the diarrhea becomes more frequent, more fetid, and sometimes bloody; gases are developed under the skin along the spine, and form wide, flat tumors, which crackle when pressed upon; -- finally, the mucus which runs from the head becomes still thicker and more fetid; a glutinous foam stops up the mouth; the eyes, filled with humor, sink in the orbits; the bodily warmth decreases; the animal sways his head from right to left, becoming insensible and cold; his head lolls on one side, and he dies, panting from exhaustion and asphyxia, on the tenth or twelfth day after the disease has been confirmed.
The carcass exhibits a repulsive appearance; the hide is dry and cracked; it sticks to the bones, which show the form of the skeleton, and the putrid decomposition which had already set in before death, seizes rapidly on all the tissues.
The course of the disease is not always the same. Sometimes the animal is agitated at first, and all the functions of life are so disturbed that death comes on in two or three days. At times the lungs are more affected than the other internal organs; the cough is more intense, and the breath hurried and obstructed.
When once seen, it is impossible to mistake this disease (ox typhus - cattle plague) for any other, unless it be the chest complaint, called per-pneumonia, which is likewise contagious; but in per- or pleuro-pneumonia the attack is generally insidious, -- the eyes preserve their vivacity, and the appetite is not lost until towards the close. In this disorder (pleuro-pneumonia) a short, dry cough shows itself from the outbreak and persists; the breathing is frequent and painful; and the sides of the chest, when struck with the fingers, give out the hard, solid sound of a full barrel (flatness), this percussion being painful. The eyes, nose, and mouth do not discharge those purulent secretions seen in typhus, and the diarrhoea only comes on at the end, being less frequent and fetid. In the milch cows the milk decreases, but is not quite suppressed.
The heat of the horns and lower extremities is retained, and the pneumonia runs its course more regularly, the animal dying about the fourth week. Thus it will be seen that the two distempers widely differ in their symptoms
The cattle plague (ox typhus) is by far the most formidable malady which can attack animals. When left to itself, or treated without judgment, it carries off ninety cattle out of a hundred. In prior visitations, and especially in 1750, when six millions of horned cattle were swept off in Europe, England lost from three to four hundred thousand, and the number of cattle which have perished in England from June to October, 1865, exceeds sixty thousand.
Every farmer who keeps many cattle should divide them into several classes; thus: -- First. The sound and healthy that have had no direct or indirect intercourse with tainted cattle, and these must be kept carefully isolated. Second. Cattle which, though unaffected, have been exposed in cars, ships, or markets. These are to be made the subject of treatment the moment the first sign of the disease shows itself. Third. Cattle actually smitten with the plague, to be treated according to each stage of the disease.
The healthy cattle must be removed from the farm, or, if they remain at the rack, must be taken out twice daily for the twofold purpose of taking wholesome exercise and allowing their stalls and sheds to be thoroughly cleaned. Their feeding should also be carefully watched, and the following provisions added to their daily supplies:
| Pounded oats | . . . . | 4 pounds |
| Pounded juniper berries | . . . . | 1 pound. |
| Powdered gentian | . . . . | 1 ounce. |
| Sulphate of iron | . . . . | 2 drachms. |
| Carbonate of soda | . . . . | 2 drachms. |
Whilst in the fields, the cattle should not be allowed to drink out of ponds or at any stagnant or muddy water.
Cattle belonging to our second class (having been exposed to infection) must receive the same strengthening and tonic ration in the morning, and twice every day take the following anti-contagious preparation:
Chlorate of potash, 2 drachms; water, 1/2 pint.
Dissolve and mix with one gallon sage or hysop tea; to be given when drink is given them.
The use of this anti-contagious drink is of the highest importance. It should be continued even after the plague has broken out.
During the absence of those cattle which are undergoing the preventive treatment, let the healthy condition of their stalls and sheds be looked to.
Be careful to take out the litter every day; wash the floor and cleanse it thoroughly; ventilate the place well; fumigate it with burnt sulphur or dried juniper berries, sage and rosemary, salted with saltpetre, and a little arsenic. This will burn readily if placed on a pan of coals. At night, tar, creosote, benzine, petroleum or iodine may be left in the stable, to diffuse their vapors and modify the air.
As the cattle plague, or ox typhus, when once developed in the ox, cow, or sheep, usually pursues its course, the various functions of the body are so changed that they vary during the different stages of the disorder, the fever at first producing excitement, but in the latter stages great exhaustion. Hence it requires a high degree of skill, practical experience, and vigilance. During the disorder the ox undergoes in two weeks all the feverish commotion which a man laboring under typhoid fever would be subject to in a month.
The phenomena succeed each other with terrific swiftness, leaving barely time for the medicines to act.
At the outbreak of the disorder, abolish solid feeding. This is easily done, as the animal has lost his appetite. Give him, instead, half a pailful of soaked hay, adding to it a sprinkling of salt; or give water, whitened with bran and flour, with a little vinegar, three or four times daily. When the animal coughs and his breathing is oppressed, give him warm drinks, such as steamed barley and oats, or a hot mash, and cover him well with blankets, but don't exclude the fresh air."
The following "hygienic measures" are to be taken against the extension of the plague:
The contagious matters are all kinds of cattle of the ox tribe, and also hides, hair, horns, and hoofs of those killed or dead with the plague.
The intestinal discharges are the principal agents that spread the disorder.
Hence all articles that have been in contact with a diseased animal or any of its discharges, are capable of carrying the infection for an indefinite time, as racks of wood, or iron cribs, or mangers of wood, iron, or stone; collars, straps, ropes, chains, harness, carts, wagons, or carriages, which they have touched; gutters or drains in which their urine has flowed; all implements for removing manure; the manure heap; the ground on which they have stood; paths and roads on which diseased cattle have walked or been drawn etc., etc. -- to all and any of which, disinfectants must be applied
Burying deeply in dry ground is the quickest, cheapest, and most certain way of disinfecting an animal dead from the plague
The droppings, straw, and all other matters conyaminated should also be buried, so that they cannot be disturbed for a long time.
Manure heaps and down-trodden manure of cattle yards, if infected by even a small quantity of the droppings of a diseased animal, should be removed to a suitable place, and covered with a layer of earth.
Floors of any shed or stable in which diseased cattle have stood, if not formed of water-tight and impenetrable material, must be assumed to be infected to the depth of six inches. Half rotten wood is an especially favorable carrier of infection: Any lining of a pen where a diseased animal has stood, should be broken out and burned.
All infected articles, as racks of wood or iron etc., can be disinfected by exposing them to a heat which will char wood, and all such of iron should then be galvanized.
Chloride of Lime is among the cheapest and most powerful of artificial disinfectants, and should be applied as much as possible in solution. It is not applicable to large quantities of manure, or to matters rich in ammonia, as putrid urine. One pound of chloride of lime to one gallon of water can be distributed by a garden engine, or by a wateringpot, after a thorough scrubbing and scraping of stalls, etc. All brooms and other implements, or persons stepping from a dirty or partially cleaned place to a clean one, may suffice to bring back infection. Workmen must also be careful to wash their own bodies and hair with soap, and to destroy such clothing as is of little value, or have the other disinfected in chloride of lime water.
Despatches received by the Department of State from the United-States consul at Liverpool, under date of March 12, 1866, give the following remedies now in use, said to be very effective:
1 oz. of Peruvian bark, 1 oz. of gentian, 1 oz. of ground ginger, 2 drs. of sulphate of iron, 4 table-spoonfuls of molasses, and 1 glass of brandy or whisky. Dose, once a day.
The other prescription is: - 1 lb. of onions, small and strong; 1 lb. of garlic, 1 lb. of ground ginger, 3/4 lb. of asafoetida; to be covered with water and stirred on the fire till in a milky pulp; then put over the other articles; add of rice-water 3 pints for every 2 of the mixture. Dose for a cow - 1 pint a day.
Among the many methods adopted to preserve milk for a lengthened period, is that of M. Pasteur. He has found that if milk be heated to 212°, the boiling-point of water, it will remain sweet for a few days; if heated to 220° (under pressure, of course), it will remain sweet for several weeks; but if heated to 250°, the milk will keep for any number of years.
The cheapest and easiest method of adulterating milk is by adding water, and we may readily ascertain the exact extent of adulteration by the following plan. If a glass tube, divided into 100 parts, be filled with milk and left standing for 24 hours, the cream will rise to the upper part of the tube, and occupy from 11 to 13 divisions, if the milk is genuine.
Milk becomes sour by the formation of lactic acid, which is rapidly developed at a temperature of 10° to 90°. The best way to preserve milk sweet for domestic purposes, is to add to it every day a few grains of carbonate of soda per pint, to keep the milk alkaline.
The following account of this disease has been condensed from a report made in April, 1866, by a commission of scientific and medical men, appointed by the Chicago Academy of Sciences, and may be regarded as thoroughly reliable:
Trichina is the term applied to a minute animal (parasite) known for some time to have existed in the muscles of man, and which could be bred in the muscles of some other mammals by feeding them with it. More recently it has been discovered to occur naturally in the muscles of swine. It is a minute, slender, and transparent worm, scarcely 1-20th of an inch in length. After this animal becomes introduced into the stomach of man, or other animals susceptible to its ravages and which may feed upon flesh infected with it, the worms become freed from their capsules by the action of the digestive fluid, and range freely in the stomach and intestines of the custodian. Their development proceeds rapidly, and procreation takes place within 4 or 5 days; each female gives birth to from 60 to 100 young, and dies soon after. The young thread-like worm remains for a short time within the lining membrane of the intestines, causing irritation, diarrhea, and sometimes death if present in sufficient numbers. After attaining a proper size and strength, these young trichinae begin to penetrate the walls of the intestines, and make their way toward their proper homes, the voluntary muscles. In traversing the muscles they do not seem to penetrate the fibres of the muscle, but to wind their way between them. At this time they cause to those afflicted great muscular pain and soreness, cramps, and even tetanic symptoms. After about 4 weeks migration they commence to encyst themselves in the muscular fibre, none having ever been found encysted in fat or the other tissues. They perforate the walls of the fibre selected as their abode, pass into it, and fasten themselves in the space so made. The worm then secretes a delicate membranous sac, which finally becomes calcareous by still further secretions. It is only in man, however, that these calcareous cysts have been observed, hogs being usually killed long before time has elapsed for the accumulation of sufficient lime. The young trichina having now reached its torpid stage, it will so remain during the lifetime of its custodian. It feeds no longer, but goes on slowly in development until it has reached the condition of puberty, and then awaits its chances of freedom to "commence its cycle." They can breed but once in the body of one and the same animal. They have been known to cause partial paralysis of certain muscles by the great number embedded in them. So much now for the history of this animal and its mode of life, and cause of disease. Now to what extent does this parasite exist in this country?
An examination of this medical commission made in Chicago, Ill., during the spring of 1866, of 1394 hogs, 28 of them, or 1 in 48, were found to contain trichinae, and numbering in each hog from 48 to 18,000 trichinae to a cubic inch.
As no trichina nor germ of trichina has aver been found in vegetable food, the parasite must inevitably come through the eating of flesh of some kind. A strict attention to the feeding of hogs and their confinement in pens where no animal food is accessible, is an infallible preventative against Trichiniasis. As the disease cannot be detected by external appearance, no farmer can tell if the disease exists among his animals, nor should he be blamed if he sells animals found to be affected with trichinae. The use of the microscope will effectually tell if the muscles of the hog be free from this parasite.
To do this it is simply necessary to thoroughly cook the pork, so that every portion of the meat shall have experienced a temperature of at least 160° Fahr. This is of the utmost importance; it is owing to eating pork uncooked that has occasioned such loss of life among the poorer classes in Germany. Again, by properly salting and smoking the meat for at least 10 days, the trichinae, should they exist, will be certainly killed. Simple desiccation of the meat, if continued for a period of sufficient length, will also kill them; as for instance they will never be found in old hams; mere pickling, however, does not appear to have any effect upon these worms. When we reflect, then, that but 1 hog out of 48 of the 1394 examined was found to contain trichina at all, and but one in 300 was found to contain them in sufficient number to cause considerable danger, and that even in these cases the worms are rendered innocuous by proper smoking, drying, or cooking, we cannot see that the popular panic which now exists should be permitted to continue among intelligent persons, and thus deprive ninetenths of our agricultural population of one of their chief articles of food.
|
|