GENERAL HINTS

Dominion, Volume 22, Issue 52, 24 November 1928, Page 18

GENERAL HINTS

Keep linseed oil and lime water in the house at all times; it is the best remedy for burns.

Many complexions are ruined by severe massage. If you resort to home treatment use the massage gently. Acetic acid will cure warts on the hands if each wart is touched with the acid. lodine will also cure them if used long enough to dry the skin. Buttermilk is good to clear the complexion, but great care must be taken afterwards, as it makes the skin tender and liable to tan more easily. A quarter of a teaspoonful of salt taken in a glass of water at each meal for three weeks will make wonderful improvement in the complexion.

Horseradish leaves scalded in hot vinegar will cure severe pain. The leaves should be wrapped in thin muslin before being applied, or they will blister the skin.

Too frequent washing of the hair will fade it, if not ruin its growth ; and beware of soda and ammonia. Too much alkali makes brown hair the colour of ashes, and gives a yellow tinge to grey hair. Moths will not attack clothes which have been sprinkled with turpentine. Raisins can be stoned much more easily if they are first warmed in a cool oven or in front of the fire.

Children's stockings will last longer if darned neatly over heels, toes, and knees, when new, on the wrong side.

A handful of salt should be added to the water in which pocket handkerchiefs are soaked.

Always remove skin and bone from fish while it is still warm; they come away quite easily then. If new tinware is rubbed over with fresh lard and then thoroughly heated in the oven before it is used it will not rust afterwards. Rub mirrors which have become cloudy with a cloth wrung out of cold water and dipped in dry whiting, and then polish them with a dry duster. When washing stockings, if they are not too delicate, a soft nail-brush is useful for brushing out stains which sometimes appear at the soles and heels. If the stockings are at all splashed they should be soaked first in cold water for a few hours before attempting to wash them, but if the mud stains are obstinate and still refuse to disappear, rub them gently with a little carbonate of soda, using a piece of clean flannel, and then iron well on the wrong side.