Roast a lemon in the oven, turning now and then, that all sides may be equally cooked. It should not crack, or burst, but be soft all through. Just before going to bed take the lemon (which should be very hot), cut a piece from the top, and fill it with as much white sugar as it will hold.

“Chock-full—do you mean?” asked an old gentleman to whom I recommended the palatable remedy.

“If that is very full—pressed down, and running over—I mean chock-full!” I replied.

Eat all the sugar, filling the lemon with more, as you find it becoming acid.

This simple remedy induces gentle perspiration, besides acting favorably upon the clogged membranes of the throat. I have known it to prove wonderfully efficacious in removing severe attacks of hoarseness.

Another,

And far less pleasant prescription, is a teaspoonful of vinegar made thick with common salt. Having myself been, in earlier years, more than once the grateful victim of its severely benevolent agency, I cannot but endorse the dose.

But—try the lemon first.

For Sore Throat. Maltese cross

1 drachm chlorate of potassa dissolved in 1 cupful of hot water.

Let it cool; take a table-spoonful three times a day, and gargle with the same, every hour.

Before retiring at night, rub the outside of the throat, especially the soft portions opposite the tonsils, with a little cold water, made so thick with common salt that the crystals will scratch the skin smartly. Do this faithfully until there is a fair degree of external irritation; then, bind a bit of flannel about the throat.

Free use of cracked or pounded ice is also admirable for sore throat of every kind. The patient should hold bits of ice in his mouth and let them slowly dissolve.

Desperate cases of ulcerated sore throat are sometimes relieved by the constant use of this and the chlorate of potassa gargle.

For a Cough.

Eat slowly, three or four times a day, six lumps of sugar, saturated with the very best whiskey you can get.

Having tested this “old woman’s prescription” for myself, and found in it the messenger of healing to a cough of several months’ standing which had set physicians and cod-liver oil at defiance, I write it down here without scruples or doubt.

For Cholera Symptoms, Maltese cross

Summer complaint, or any of the numerous forms of diseased bowels—pin a bandage of red flannel as tightly about the abdomen as is consistent with comfort, having first heated it well at the fire or register. The application is inexpressibly soothing to the racked and inflamed intestines, and will, sometimes, combined with perfect quiet on the part of the patient, and judicious diet, cure even dysentery without medicine. Persons who have chronic maladies of this class should wear the red flannel bandage constantly.

For years, this has been my invariable treatment of the disorders which are, particularly in the summer, the torment of children and terror of mothers, and the results have been most gratifying. I keep in what may be called my “accident drawer,” red flannel, divided into bandages of various lengths, and to these is recourse had in slight, and even violent cases, instead of to drugs. If the patient is suffering intense pain, steep a flannel pad large enough to cover the affected part, in hot spirits (you may add a little laudanum in severe cases) and bind upon the abdomen with the flannel bandage, renewing whenever the sufferer feels that it is growing cold.

Above all things else, keep the patient quiet in bed, if possible, but in a recumbent position—and the feet warm with flannel or bottles of hot water. These are always preferable to bricks, or hot boards for warming the extremities, being clean, safe and good preservers of heat.

The diet should be light and nourishing, avoiding liquids and acids as much as possible. Let the patient quench his thirst by holding small bits of ice in his mouth, or, if he must drink, let him have mucilaginous beverages, such as gum-arabic water. The burning thirst consequent upon these diseases may be measurably allayed by eating, very slowly, dry gum arabic, which has, likewise, curative qualities.

Mustard Plasters. Maltese cross

It should be more generally known that a few drops of sweet oil, or lard, rubbed lightly over the surface of a mustard plaster, will prevent it from blistering the skin. The patient may fearlessly wear it all night, if he can bear the burning better than the pain it has relieved temporarily, and be none the worse for the application. This, I know, to be infallible, and those who have felt the torture of a mustard-blister, should rejoice to become acquainted with this easy and sure preventive.

A mustard plaster is an excellent remedy for severe and obstinate nausea. It must be applied, hot, to the pit of the stomach. In less serious cases, flannel, dipped in hot camphor, wrung out and applied, still smoking, will often succeed. A drop of camphor in a single teaspoonful of water, given every twenty minutes, for an hour or so, is also a good palliative of nausea.

For Nausea. Maltese cross

But the specific for nausea, from whatever cause, is Hosford’s Acid Phosphate, a by no means unpleasant medicine. Put twenty drops into a goblet of ice-water; add a little sugar, and let the patient sip it, a teaspoonful, at a time, every ten or fifteen minutes. Or, where more active measures are required, give a drop in a teaspoonful of water, every five minutes for an hour. At the same time use the mustard plaster as above directed.

My reader, to whatever “school” she may belong, would not frown at what may seem to her like unlawful dabbling in the mysteries of medicine, had she stood with me beside the bed of a woman who had not been able, for three days and nights, to retain a particle of nourishment upon her stomach; who was pronounced by physicians to be actually dying of nausea—and seen her relieved of all dangerous symptoms, within the hour, by the harmless palliative I have named.

Inter nos, sister mine, in the matter of drugs I am heterodox, choosing, in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred, to trust dear old, Mother Nature, and skillful, intelligent nursing. But to become a good nurse one should possess some knowledge of Materia Medica, especially in the matter of what are known as “simples.”

For Chapped Hands and Lips. Maltese cross

First, wash the hands with Indian, or oatmeal and water, and wipe them perfectly dry. Then—do this just before retiring for the night—rub the chapped members well with melted—not hot-mutton-tallow, “tried out” pur et simple, or beaten up, while warm, with a little rose-water. Lubricate thoroughly; draw a pair of old kid gloves—never black ones—upon your hands, and do not remove them until morning. A single application will usually effect a cure, but should it fail, repeat the treatment for two or three nights.

For Sore Eyes. Maltese cross

Beat up half a teaspoonful of powdered alum to a curd with the white of an egg; spread upon soft linen, and lay on the inflamed lid. It is a soothing, and often potent remedy.

Strong tea, black, green, or mixed, strained and cold, is an excellent eye-wash. At night, lay cold tea-leaves within a soft linen bag, squeeze almost dry, and bind over the eye.

For a stye, many physicians advise the sufferer to take internally brewer’s yeast, a table-spoonful at a dose. It is sometimes singularly successful, being a good purifier of the blood.

Mixture for Cleaning Black Cloth, or Worsted Dresses.

Equal quantities of strong black tea and alcohol.

Fine scented soap.

Dip a sponge in boiling water, squeeze as dry as you can, and rub while hot, upon the sweet soap. Wet with the mixture of tea and alcohol, and sponge the worsted material to be cleaned, freely. Bub the spots hard, washing out the sponge frequently in hot water, then squeezing it. Finally, sponge off the whole surface of the cloth quickly with the mixture, wiping always in one direction if you are cleansing broadcloth.

Iron, while very damp, on the wrong side.

Cleansing Cream.

1 ounce pure glycerine.

1 ounce ether.

1 ounce spirits of wine.

¼ pound best Castile soap.

¼ pound ammonia.

The soap must be scraped fine, the rest of the materials worked into it.

To use it, wet a soft flannel cloth with it; rub grease and dirt-spots upon worsted garments or black silk, until the cloth is well impregnated with the cream. Then sponge off with clean hot water, and rub dry with a clean cloth.

To Clean Marble. Maltese cross

The pumice soap made by the Indexical Soap Manufacturing Co., Boston, Mass., is the best preparation I have ever used for removing dirt and stains from marble. I have even extracted ink-spots with it. Wet a soft flannel cloth, rub on the soap, then on the stain, and wash the whole surface of mantel or slab with the same, to take off dust, grease, etc. Wash off with fair water, and rub dry. The polish of the marble is rather improved than injured by the process. The same soap is invaluable in a family for removing ink, fruit-stains, and even paint from the hands. The makers of the pumice soap, Robinson & Co., are also the manufacturers of the “silver soap,” for cleaning plate which has nearly superseded all plate-powders, whiting, etc., formerly used for this purpose.

Pumpkin Flour. Maltese cross

I remind myself, comically, while jotting down these items of domestic practicalities, of the lucky chicken of the brood, who, not content with having secured her tit-bit of crumb, seed, or worm, noisily calls the attention of all her sisters to the fact. I never secure even a small prize in the housewifely line, but I am seized with the desire to spread the knowledge of the same.

About three months ago, my very courteous and intelligent grocer (I think sometimes, that nobody else was ever blessed with such merchants of almost every article needed for family use, as those with whom I deal) handed me, for inspection, a small box of what looked like yellow tooth-powder, and smelled like vanilla and orris-root. It was pumpkin flour, he explained—the genuine pumpkin, desiccated by the “Alden process,” and ground very fine. I took it home for the sake of the goodly smell, and because it looked “nice.”

The pies made from it were delicious beyond all my former experience in Thanksgiving desserts—a soft, smooth, luscious custard, procured without cost of stewing, straining, etc. And the flavor of them upon the tongue fully justified the promise of the odor that had bewitched me. It is seldom in a lifetime that one finds a thing which looks “nice,” smells nicer, and tastes nicest of all. If you, dearest and patientest of readers, who never quarrel with my digressions, and hearken indulgently to my rhodomontades, doubt now whether I am in very earnest, try my pumpkin flour, and bear witness with me to its excellence.[B]

Another Treasure.

Those who are fond of Julienne soups, and would oftener please themselves and their families by making or ordering them, were not the work of preparing the vegetables properly, tedious, and so often a failure, should not hesitate to purchase freely the packages of shred and dried vegetables now put up expressly for Julienne soups, and sold in nearly all first-class groceries. They are imported from France, but are not at all expensive. Full directions for their use accompany them.

Seymour Pudding.

½ cup of molasses.

½ cup of milk.

½ cup of raisins, seeded, and cut in half.

½ cup of currants.

½ cup of suet, powdered.

½ teaspoonful of soda.

1 egg.

1½ cups of Graham flour.

Spice, and salt to taste.

Boil, or steam for 2½ hours.

Strawberry Shortcake.

1 cup of powdered sugar.

1 table-spoonful of butter, rubbed into the sugar.

3 eggs.

1 cup prepared flour—a heaping cup.

2 table-spoonfuls of cream.

Bake in three jelly-cake tins.

When quite cold, lay between the cakes nearly a quart of fresh, ripe strawberries. Sprinkle each layer lightly with powdered sugar, and strew the same thickly over the uppermost cake. Eat while fresh.

Welsh Rarebit.

½ pound of English cheese.

3 eggs, well beaten.

1 scant cup of fine bread-crumbs.

3 table-spoonfuls of butter, melted.

2 teaspoonfuls of made mustard.

1 saltspoonful of salt.

Mix all well together, and beat to a smooth paste. Have ready some slices of toasted bread, from which the crust has been pared; spread them thickly with the mixture, and set them upon the upper grating of the oven until they are slightly browned. Serve at once.