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House Cleaning: Walls

To Renovate Blackened Walls. -A smoked or blackened ceiling or wall may be cleaned by means of a cloth wrung out of a strong solution of baking soda and water. Or use vinegar and water. If the stain is not all removed, dissolve gum shellac in alcohol to the consistency of milk or cream and with it cover the sooty parts. Paint or whitewash over the shellac. The black will not show through.

To Dry Walls that Are Damp. - If there is much dampness in a room that is not commonly heated, it may cause the walls to mold or mildew, besides being unhealthy. To absorb the dampness, place unslaked lime in flat, open vessels, as dripping pans, plates, or saucers. Lime has an affinity for dampness and also purifies the air.

Renew the lime as fast as it becomes air-slaked and crumbles into a fine, dry powder.

Walls are often damp for no apparent cause. Brick and other porous walls may hold moisture, or it may work up from springs through the foundations of brick or stone houses.

The causes should be sought and, if possible, removed.

To prepare damp walls for calcimine or paper, make a size of 1 ounce of glue to 1 gallon of water, and add 4 ounces of alum and 4 ounces of boiled linseed oil. Apply one or two coats and let dry before papering.

Or apply with a whitewash brush, during summer when the wall is dryer, a solution of 1 pound of castile or other hard white soap in 1 gallon of water. Let stand a day or two to dry. Follow with a second coat of pound of alum in a pailful of water, and let dry before papering.

Or, if the walls are very damp, apply thin sheet lead or tin foil to the walls with a suitable cement. Or fasten with flat-headed copper tacks.