Important: Safety Warning
This page contains a formula or preparation using substances now known to be dangerously toxic, such as arsenic, mercury, lead, or cyanide compounds. Exposure to these substances can cause severe poisoning, permanent injury, or death.
In addition, this page recommends pest-control substances such as arsenic compounds, strychnine, or cyanide — in some cases applied to food crops. These substances are lethal to humans and animals, and their use is now banned or strictly controlled.
This information has been left in for historical purposes but should not be acted upon.
Home › Contributions From Friends On Household Economy › Cockroaches and Bed-Bugs
Cockroaches and Bed-Bugs
Cockroaches are the plague of many housekeepers, and yet a little Paris green is death to them. Keep it in a common flourdredging box, label it poison, and apply it weekly to their haunts. Bed-bugs or chinch-bugs can also be dispersed and utterly routed with this remedy; and both cockroaches and bed-bugs will flee from powdered borax. Travelers should always carry a paper of borax in their bags, and sprinkle it under and over their pillows, if they fear they shall become food for the last-named wretches.