CHAPTER XXII.

WASHING, IRONING, AND CLEANSING.

Many a woman without servants, or with those untrained, must do her own washing and ironing, or train others to do it, and this is the most trying department of housekeeping. The following may aid in lessening labor and care.

It saves washing and is more healthful to use flannel shirts. Farmers, sailors, and soldiers have found by experience that they are more comfortable than cotton or linen, even in the hottest days. Many gentlemen use them for common wear, changing to a cotton-flannel night-gown for sleeping. So young children can have a flannel jacket and flannel drawers sewed to the jacket in front, and buttoned behind, and change them at night for cotton-flannel made in the same way. The under-garments for women may be made of the same material and pattern, and this will save washing and promote health.

Some ladies economize time and labor by wearing three-cornered lace articles for the neck, trimmed with imitation Valenciennes lace, wash them in their wash-bowl, whiten in soap-suds in a tumbler or bowl in their window, stiffen with gum-arabic, and after stretching, press under weights between clean papers. This is a happy contrivance when on a journey or without servants. Those who wish to save all needless labor in washes should have under-garments and night-gowns made in sack forms or other fashions that save in both material and labor. They also should omit ruffles and other trimmings that increase the labor of ironing.

There is nothing which tends more effectually to secure good washing than a full supply of all conveniences. A plenty of soft water is a very important item. When this can not be had, lye or soda can be put in hard water, to soften it. Borax is safer than soda, which turns white clothes yellow, and injures texture. Buy crude borax, and for a common washing use half an ounce. A _borax soap_ is thus made: To a pound of bar-soap, cut in small pieces, put a quart of hot water and an ounce of powdered borax. Heat and mix, but do not boil, cool and cut into cakes, and use like hard soap. Soak the white clothes in a suds made of this soap over night, and it saves much rubbing. Two wash-forms are needed; one for the two tubs in which to put the suds, and the other for bluing and starching-tubs. Four tubs, of different sizes, are necessary; also, a large _wooden_ dipper, (as metal is apt to rust;) two or three pails; a grooved washboard; a clothes-line, (sea-grass or horse-hair is best;) a wash-stick to move clothes when boiling, and a wooden fork to take them out. Soap-dishes, made to hook on the tubs, save soap and time. Provide, also, a clothes-bag, in which to boil clothes; an indigo-bag, of double flannel; a starch-strainer, of coarse linen; a bottle of ox-gall for calicoes; a supply of starch, neither sour nor musty; several dozens of clothes-pins, which are cleft sticks, used to fasten clothes on the line; a bottle of dissolved gum-arabic; two clothes-baskets; and a brass or copper kettle, for boiling clothes, as iron is apt to rust. A closet for keeping all these things is a great convenience. Tubs, pails, and all hooped wooden ware, should be kept out of the sun, and in a cool place, or they will fall to pieces.

COMMON MODE OF WASHING.

Assort the clothes, and put those most soiled in soak the night before. Never pour hot water on them, as it sets the dirt. In assorting clothes, put the flannels in one lot, the colored clothes in another, the coarse white ones in a third, and the fine clothes in a fourth lot. Wash the fine clothes in one tub of suds. When clothes are very much soiled, a second suds is needful, turning them wrong side out. Put them in the boiling-bag, and boil them in strong suds for half an hour, and not much more. Move them, while boiling, with the clothes-stick. Take them out of the boiling-bag, and put them into a tub of water, and rub the dirtiest places again, if need be. Throw them into the rinsing-water, and then wring them out, and put them into the bluing-water. Put the articles to be stiffened into a clothes-basket by themselves, and, just before hanging out, dip them in starch, clapping it in, so as to have them equally stiff in all parts. Hang white clothes in the sun, and colored ones (wrong side out) in the shade. Fasten them with clothes-pins. Then wash the coarser white articles in the same manner. Then wash the colored clothes. These must not be soaked, nor have lye or soda put in the water, and they ought not to lie wet long before hanging out, as it injures their colors. Beef’s-gall, one spoonful to two pailfuls of suds, improves calicoes. Lastly, wash the flannels in suds as hot as the hand can bear. Never rub on soap, as this shrinks them in spots. Wring them out of the first suds, and throw them into another tub of hot suds, turning them wrong side out. Then throw them into hot bluing-water. Do not put bluing into suds, as it makes specks in the flannel. Never leave flannels long in water, nor put them in cold or lukewarm water. Before hanging them out, shake and stretch them. Some housekeepers have a close closet, made with slats across the top. On these slats, they put their flannels, when ready to hang out, and then burn brimstone under them, for ten minutes. It is but little trouble, and keeps the flannels as white as new. Wash the colored flannels and hose after the white, adding more hot water. Some persons dry woolen hose on stocking-boards, shaped like a foot and leg, with strings to tie them on the line. This keeps them from shrinking, and makes them look better than if ironed. It is also less work than to iron them properly.

Bedding should be washed in long days, and in hot weather. Empty straw beds once a year.

The following cautions in regard to calicoes are useful. Never wash them in very warm water; and change the water when it appears dingy, or the light parts will look dirty. Never rub on soap; but remove grease with French chalk, starch, magnesia, or Wilmington clay. Make starch for black calicoes with coffee-water, to prevent any whitish appearance. Glue is good for stiffening calicoes. When laid aside, not to be used, all stiffening should be washed out, or they will often be injured. Never let calicoes freeze in drying. Some persons use bran-water (four quarts of wheat-bran to two pails of water), and no soap, for calicoes; washing and rinsing in the bran-water. Potato-water is equally good. Take eight peeled and grated potatoes to one gallon of water.

_To cleanse Gentlemen’s Broadcloths._—The best way, which the writer has repeatedly tried with unfailing success, is the following: Take one beef’s-gall, half a pound of saleratus, and four gallons of warm water. Lay the article on a table, and scour it thoroughly, in every part, with a clothes-brush dipped in this mixture. The collar of a coat, and the grease-spots, (previously marked by stitches of white thread,) must be repeatedly brushed. Then take the article and rinse it up and down in the mixture. Then rinse it up and down in a tub of soft cold water. Then, without wringing or pressing, hang it to drain and dry. Fasten a coat up by the collar. When perfectly dry, it is sometimes the case, with coats, that nothing more is needed. In other cases, it is necessary to dampen with a sponge the parts which look wrinkled, and either pull them smooth with the fingers, or press them with an iron, having a piece of bombazine or thin woolen cloth between the iron and the article.

TO MANUFACTURE LYE, SOAP, STARCH, AND OTHER ARTICLES USED IN WASHING.

_To make Lye._—Provide a large tub, made of pine or ash, and set it on a form, so high that a tub can stand under it. Make a hole, an inch in diameter, near the bottom, on one side. Lay bricks inside about this hole, and straw over them. To every seven bushels of ashes add two gallons of unslacked lime, and throw in the ashes and lime in alternate layers. While putting in the ashes and lime, pour on boiling water, using three or four pailfuls. After this, add a pailful of cold soft water once an hour, till all the ashes appear to be well soaked. Catch the drippings in a tub and try its strength with an egg. If the egg rise so as to show a circle as large as a ten-cent piece, the strength is right; if it rise higher, the lye must be weakened by water; if not so high, the ashes are not good, and the whole process must be repeated, putting in fresh ashes, and running the weak lye through the new ashes, with some additional water. _Quick-lye_ is made by pouring one gallon of boiling soft water on three quarts of ashes, and straining it. Oak ashes are best.

_To make Soft Soap._—Save all drippings and fat, melt them, and set them away in cakes. Some persons keep, for soap-grease, a half-barrel, with weak lye in it, and a cover over it. To make soft soap, take the proportion of one pailful of lye to three pounds of fat. Melt the fat, and pour in the lye, by degrees. Boil it steadily, through the day, till it is ropy. If not boiled enough, on cooling it will turn to lye and sediment. While boiling, there should always be a little oil on the surface. If this does not appear, add more grease. If there is too much grease, on cooling, it will rise, and can be skimmed off. Try it, by cooling a small quantity. When it appears like jelly on becoming cold, it is done. It must then be put in a cool place and often stirred.

_To make cold Soft Soap_, melt thirty pounds of grease, put it in a barrel, add four pailfuls of strong lye, and stir it up thoroughly. Then gradually add more lye, till the barrel is nearly full, and the soap looks _about right_.

_To make Potash-Soap_, melt thirty-nine pounds of grease, and put it in a barrel. Take twenty-nine pounds of light ash-colored potash, (the _reddish_-colored will spoil the soap,) and pour hot water on it; then pour it off into the grease, stirring it well. Continue thus till all the potash is melted. Add one pailful of cold water, stirring it a great deal every day, till the barrel be full, and then it is done. This is the cheapest and best kind of soap. It is best to sell ashes and buy potash. The soap is better, if it stand a year before it is used; therefore make two barrels at once.

_To prepare Starch._—Take four table-spoonfuls of starch; put in as much water, and rub it, till all lumps are removed. Then add half a cup of cold water. Pour this into a quart of boiling water, and boil it for half an hour, adding a piece of spermaceti, or a lump of salt or sugar, as large as a hazelnut. Strain it, and put in a very little bluing. Thin it with hot water.

_Beef’s-Gall._—Send a junk-bottle to the butcher, and have several gall-bladders emptied into it. Keep it salted, and in a cool place. Some persons perfume it; but fresh air removes the unpleasant smell which it gives, when used for clothes.

DIRECTIONS FOR STARCHING MUSLINS AND LACES.

Many ladies clap muslins, then dry them, and afterward sprinkle them. This saves time. Others clap them till nearly dry, then fold and cover, and then iron them. Iron wrought muslins on soft flannel, and on the wrong side.

_To do up Laces nicely_, sew a clean piece of muslin around a long bottle, and roll the lace on it; pulling out the edge, and rolling it so that the edge will turn in, and be covered as you roll. Fill the bottle with water, and then boil it for an hour in a suds made with white soap. Rinse it in fair water, a little blue; dry it in the sun; and, if any stiffening is wished, use thin starch or gum-arabic. When dry, fold and press it between white papers in a large book. It improves the lace to wet it with sweet-oil, after it is rolled on the bottle, and before boiling in the suds. _Blonde laces_ can be whitened by rolling them on a bottle in this way, and then setting the bottle in the sun, in a dish of cold suds made with white soap, wetting it thoroughly, and changing the suds every day. Do this for a week or more; then rinse in fair water; dry it on the bottle in the sun, and stiffen it with white gum-arabic. Lay it away in loose folds. _Lace veils_ can be whitened by laying them in flat dishes, in suds made with white soap; then rinsing, and stiffening them with gum-arabic, stretching them, and pinning them on a sheet to dry.

ARTICLES TO BE PROVIDED FOR IRONING.

Provide the following articles: A woolen ironing-blanket, and a linen or cotton sheet to spread over it; a large fire, of charcoal and hard wood, (unless furnaces or stoves are used;) a hearth free from cinders and ashes, a piece of sheet-iron in front of the fire, on which to set the irons while heating; (this last saves many black spots from careless ironers;) three or four holders, made of woolen, and covered with old silk, as these do not easily take fire; two iron-rings or iron-stands, on which to set the irons, and small pieces of board to put under them, to prevent scorching the sheet; linen or cotton wipers; and a piece of bees-wax, to rub on the irons when they are smoked. There should be at least three irons for each person ironing, and a small and large clothes-frame, on which to air the fine and coarse clothes. It is a great saving of space as well as labor to have a clothes-frame made with a large number of slats, on which to hang clothes. Then have it fastened to the wall, and, when not used, pushed flat against the wall. Any carpenter can understand how to make this.

A bosom-board, on which to iron shirt-bosoms, should be made, one foot and a half long and nine inches wide, and covered with white flannel. A skirt-board, on which to iron frock-skirts, should be made, five feet long and two feet wide at one end, tapering to one foot and three inches wide at the other end. This should be covered with flannel, and will save much trouble in ironing nice dresses. The large end may be put on the table, and the other on the back of a chair. Both these boards should have cotton covers made to fit them, and these should be changed and washed when dirty. These boards are often useful when articles are to be ironed or pressed in a chamber or parlor, and where economy of space is needful, they may be hung to a wall or door by loops on the covers. Provide, also, a press-board, for broadcloth, two feet long and four inches wide at one end, tapering to three inches wide at the other.

If the lady of the house will provide all these articles, see that the fires are properly made, the ironing-sheets evenly put on and properly pinned, the clothes-frames dusted, and all articles kept in their places, she will do much toward securing good ironing.

ON SPRINKLING, FOLDING, AND IRONING.

Wipe the dust from the ironing-board, and lay it down, to receive the clothes, which should be sprinkled with clear and warm water, and laid in separate piles, one of colored, one of common, and one of fine articles, and one of flannels. Fold the fine things, and roll them in a towel, and then fold the rest, turning them all right side outward. The colored clothes should be laid separate from the rest, and ought not to lie long damp, as it injures the colors. The sheets and table-linen should be shaken, stretched, and folded by two persons.

Iron lace and needle work on the wrong side, and carry them away as soon as dry. Iron calicoes with irons which are not very hot, and generally on the right side, as they thus keep clean for a longer time. In ironing a frock, first do the waist, then the sleeves, then the skirt. Keep the skirt rolled while ironing the other parts, and set a chair, to hold the sleeves while ironing the skirt, unless a skirt-board be used. In ironing a shirt, first do the back, then the sleeves, then the collar and bosom, and then the front. Iron silk on the wrong side, when quite damp, with an iron which is not very hot, as light colors are apt to change and fade. Iron velvet by turning up the face of the iron, and after dampening the wrong side of the velvet, draw it over the face of the iron, holding it straight and not biased.

TO WHITEN ARTICLES, AND REMOVE STAINS FROM THEM.

Wet white clothes in suds, and lay them on the grass, in the sun. It will save from grass stain, to have a clean white cloth under the articles to be whitened. Lay muslins in suds made with white soap, in a flat dish; set this in the sun, changing the suds every day. Whiten tow-cloth or brown linen by keeping it in lye through the night, laying it out in the sun, and wetting it with fair water, as fast as it dries.

Scorched articles can often be whitened again by laying them in the sun, wet with suds. Where this does not answer, put a pound of white soap in a gallon of milk, and boil the article in it. Another method is, to chop and extract the juice from two onions, and boil this with half a pint of vinegar, an ounce of white soap, and two ounces of fuller’s earth. Spread this, when cool, on the scorched part, and, when dry, wash it off in fair water. _Mildew_ may be removed by dipping the article in sour buttermilk, laying it in the sun, and, after it is white, rinsing it in fair water. Soap and chalk are also good; also, soap and starch, adding half as much salt as there is starch, together with the juice of a lemon. Stains in linen can often be removed by rubbing on soft soap, then putting on a starch paste and drying in the sun, renewing it several times. Wash off all the soap and starch in cold fair water.

MIXTURES FOR REMOVING STAINS AND GREASE.

=Stain Mixture.=—Half an ounce of oxalic acid in a pint of soft water. This can be kept in a corked bottle and is infallible in removing iron-rust and ink-stains. It is very poisonous. The article must be spread with this mixture over the steam of hot water, and wet several times. This will also remove indelible ink. The article must be washed, or the mixture will injure it.

=Another Stain-Mixture= is made by mixing one ounce of sal ammoniac, one ounce of salt of tartar, and one pint of soft water.

=To remove Grease.=—Mix four ounces of fullers earth, half an ounce of pearlash, and lemon-juice enough to make a stiff paste, which can be dried in balls, and kept for use. Wet the greased spot with cold water, rub it with the ball, dry it, and then rinse it with fair cold water. This is for _white_ articles. For silks and worsteds use French chalk, which can be procured of the apothecaries. That which is soft and white is best. Scrape it on the greased spot, under side, and let it lie for a day and night. Then brush off that used, and renew it till the spot disappears. Wilmington clay-balls are equally good. Ink-spots can often be removed from white clothes by rubbing on common tallow, leaving it for a day or two, and then washing as usual. Grease can be taken out of wall-paper by making a paste of potter’s clay, water, and ox-gall, and spreading it on the paper. When dry, renew it, till the spot disappears.

Stains on floors, from _soot_ or _stove-pipes_, can be removed by washing the spot in sulphuric acid and water. Stains in colored silk dresses can often be removed by pure water. Those made by acids, tea, wine, and fruits can often be removed by spirits of hartshorn, diluted with an equal quantity of water. Sometimes it must be repeated several times.

=Tar=, =Pitch=, and =Turpentine= can be removed by putting the spot in sweet-oil, or by spreading tallow on it, and letting it remain for twenty-four hours. Then, if the article be linen or cotton, wash it as usual; if it be silk or worsted, rub it with ether or spirits of wine.

=Lamp-Oil= can be removed from floors, carpets, and other articles by spreading upon the stain a paste made of fuller’s earth or potter’s clay, brushing off and renewing it, when dry, till the stain is removed. If gall be put into the paste, it will preserve the colors from injury. When the stain has been removed, carefully brush off the paste with a soft brush.

=Oil-Paint= can be removed by rubbing it with _very pure_ spirits of turpentine. The impure spirits leave a grease-spot. _Wax_ can be removed by scraping it off, and then holding a red hot poker near the spot. _Spermaceti_ may be removed by scraping it off, then putting a paper over the spot, and applying a warm iron. If this does not answer, rub on spirits of wine.

=Ink-Stains= in carpets and woolen table-covers can be removed by washing the spot in a liquid composed of one tea-spoonful of oxalic acid dissolved in a tea-cupful of warm (not hot) water, and then rinsing in cold water. When ink is first spilled on a woolen carpet, pour on water immediately, and sop it up several times, and no stain will be made. Often on other articles, a stream of cold water poured on the _under side_ of the ink-spot will so dilute the ink that it can be rubbed out in cold water.

=Stains on Varnished Articles=, which are caused by cups of hot water, can be removed by rubbing them with lamp-oil, and then with alcohol. Ink-stains can be taken out of mahogany by one tea-spoonful of oil of vitriol mixed with one table-spoonful of water, or by oxalic acid and water. These must be brushed over quickly, and then washed off with milk.

=Silk Handkerchiefs= and =Ribbons= can be cleansed by using French chalk to take out the grease, and then sponging them on both sides with lukewarm fair water. Stiffen them with gum-arabic, and press them between white paper, with an iron not very hot. A table-spoonful of spirits of wine to three quarts of water improves it.

=Silk Hose= or =Silk Gloves= should be washed in warm suds made with white soap, and rinsed in cold water; they should then be stretched and rubbed with a hard-rolled flannel, till they are quite dry. Ironing them very much injures their looks. _Wash-leather_ articles should have the grease removed from them by French chalk or magnesia; they should then be washed in warm suds, and rinsed in cold water. _Light Kid Gloves_ should have the grease removed from them, and then wash them on the hands with borax water and soft flannel—a tea-spoonful to a tumbler of water. Then stretch and press them. Dark Kid Gloves wash in the same way.