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TO REMOVE STAINS FROM THE HANDS

Damp the hands first with water, and then rub them with tartaric acid or salts of lemon, as you would with soap; rinse them, and rub them dry. Tartaric acid or salts of lemon will quickly remove stains from linens. Put less than a half tea-spoon of salts or acid in a table-spoon of water, wet the stain with it, and lay it in the sun for at least an hour; wet it once or twice in the time with cold water. If it does not remove the stain, repeat and lay it again in the sun. STAMMERING. If not caused by malformation of organs, reading aloud, with the teeth closed, for at least two hours a day for three or four months will cure stammering.

TO SOFTEN SPONGES. A sponge when first purchased is frequently hard, stiff and gritty. To soften it, and dislodge the particles of sea-sand from its crevices, having first soaked and squeezed it through several cold waters, put the sponge into a clean tin sauce-pan, set it over the fire, and boil it a quarter of an hour. Then take it out into a bowl of cold water, and squeeze it well. Wash out the sauce-pan, and return the sponge to it, filling up with clean, cold water, and boil it another quarter of an hour. Repeat the process, giving it three boils in fresh water, or more than three if you find it still gritty. Take care not to let it boil too long, or it will become tender and drop to pieces.

EXTRAS THROWN IN. To purify a room of unpleasant odors, burn vinegar, resin, or sugar; to make chicken gravy richer, add eggs found in chicken, or, if none, yolk of an egg; soak garden seeds in hot water a few seconds before planting; to prevent cholera in chickens, put assafoetida in water they drink, and let them pick at coal ashes; in using hard water for dish-water add a little milk; to clean paint, add to two quarts hot water, two table-spoons turpentine and one of skimmed milk, and only soap enough to make suds, and it will clean and give luster; iron rust on marble can generally be removed with lemon-juice; a thin coat of varnish applied to straw-matting makes it more durable and adds to its beauty.