Recipes for Felons

Take common rock salt, as used for salting down pork or beef, dry in an oven, then pound it fine and mix with spirits of turpentine in equal parts; put it in a rag and wrap it around the parts affected; as it gets dry put on more, and in twenty-four hours you are cured. The felon will be dead.

Or purchase the herb of stramonium at the druggist’s; steep it and bind it on the felon; as soon as cold, put on new, warm herbs. It will soon kill it, in a few hours at least.

Or saturate a bit or grated wild turnip, the size of a bean, with spirits of turpentine, and apply it to the affected part. It relieves the pain at once; in twelve hours there will be a hole to the bone, and the felon destroyed; then apply healing salve, and the finger is well.

Another Way to Cure a Felon: Fill a tumbler with equal parts of fine salt and ice; mix well. Sink the finger in the centre, allow it to remain until it is nearly frozen and numb; then withdraw it, and when sensation is restored, renew the operation four or five times, when it will be found the disease is destroyed. This must be done before pus is formed.

A simple remedy for felons, relieving pain at once, no poulticing, no cutting, no “holes to the bone,” no necessity for healing salve, but simple oil of cedar applied a few times at the commencement of the felon, and the work is done.

Source: The White House Cookbook, F.L. Gillette

To Clean Brass and Copper

Scrape a little rotten-stone fine, and make into a paste with sweet oil. Rub on with a piece of flannel; let it dry, and polish with a chamois-skin. Copper is cleaned either with vinegar and salt mixed in equal parts, or with oxalic acid. The latter is a deadly poison, and must be treated accordingly.

Source: The Easiest Way in Housekeeping and Cooking, H. Campbell

To Keep Eggs

Be sure that the eggs are fresh. Place them points down in a stone jar or tight firkin, and pour over them the following brine, which is enough for a hundred and fifty:—

One pint of slacked lime, one pint of salt, two ounces of cream of tartar, and four gallons of water. Boil all together for ten minutes; skim, and, when cold, pour it over the eggs. They can also be kept in salt tightly packed, but not as well.

Source: The Easiest Way in Housekeeping and Cooking, H. Campbell

To Remove Egg Stain from Silver

Salt when applied dry, with a soft piece of flannel will remove the stain from silver, caused by eggs.

Source: Things Mother Used To Make, L.M. Gurney

To Restore Sweetness to Tainted Butter

Cut or break the butter into very small pieces ; or, what is better, force it through a course wire sieve, so as to make it small as possible. Then put it into a churn with a sufficient quantity of new milk to swim it, and churn it well ; then take it out and work it well to free it from the milk, adding a little salt if necessary, and it will hardly be distinguished from entirely new butter.

Another way. To every pound of rancid butter, add a pint of water, into which has been put from twelve to fifteen drops of chloride of lime. Mix till all the particles are in contact with the water ; after letting it stand an hour or two, take it out and wash it in fresh water.

Source: Valuable Receipts, J.M. Prescott

To take out Mildew from Linen

Mix some soft soap with powdered starch, half as much salt, and the juice of a lemon ; apply on both sides with a brush, and lay it on the grass day and night, till the stain comes out.

Source: Valuable Receipts, J.M. Prescott

Putrid Sore Throat

Mix one gill of strong apple vinegar, cue tablespoonful of common salt, tablespoonful of strained honey, half a pod of red pepper; boil them together; strain into half a pint of strong sage tea. In severe cases give half a teaspoonful for an adult every hour; decrease the dose as the disease is relieved. Use some as a gargle.

Source: Mrs Hill’s New Cook-Book

Cure for Toothache

To one tea-spoonful of kreosote[sic] put half a tea-spoonful of alcohol. Soak a bit of cotton well with this, and put it into the tooth. No harm will arise from the use of kreosote, if care is taken not to swallow the spittle. This has been tried by the author, and found a permanent cure.

Another: Mix alum and common salt in equal quantities, finely pulverized. Then wet some cotton, large enough to fill the cavity, which cover with salt and alum, and apply it.

Source: Valuable Receipts, J.M. Prescott

Dysentery

Make a strong tea of sweet gum bark ; to a pint, add a gill of good brandy, half an ounce of laudanum, a little loaf sugar to make it palatable. Take a teaspoonful every hour until the effect of the laudanum is apparent, then at longer intervals, until the disease abates.

A very good and simple remedy, if used when the first symptoms appear, is : Give an adult five drops of spirits of turpentine
in a teaspoonful of sweet milk. Repeat, if necessary. Give a child according to age.

Another remedy : A teacup half full of apple vinegar. Dissolve as much salt in it as it will hold, leaving a little at the bottom. Pour boiling water upon the solution until the cup is three-fourths full. Scald it, and remove the scum. Take a tablespoonful three times a day.

Source: Mrs Hill’s New Cook-Book

Sore Gums

Brandy and salt will remove soreness of the gums.

Source: Valuable Receipts, J.M. Prescott