Domestic Cookery, Useful Receipts, and Hints to Young Housekeepers

of oil of vitriol; put them in a bottle, and let them stand in the sun a week; shake it often, but do not cork it tight, lest it should burst the bottle; take four pounds of black-oak bark, and the same of hickory, shave them fine, and soak them till wet through; then boil them in ten gallons of water till all the color is extracted; when take out the chips, put in a pound of alum; shake the bottle of indigo and vitriol, and pour it in; let them boil together a few minutes, and put in the yarn; turn it over several times, and let it boil half an hour; then spread it out in the sun for about an hour, and wash it well in strong soap-suds through two waters, to keep it from becoming tender. This will color ten pounds of yarn. You may have a fine blue color by omitting the bark. It will not answer for any thing but wool or silk, as the vitriol will destroy linen or cotton. To Dye Cotton Blue. Boil a pound of chipped logwood in water enough to cover the cotton; take out half a gallon, and dissolve in it an ounce of verdigris, and one of alum; boil the yarn in the logwood water an hour, stirring it, and keeping it loose; then take it out, and mix in the verdigris; put back the yarn, and let it boil four hours, stir all the time, and take it out every hour to give it air, dry it in the sun, and the next day boil it in soap-suds. This will dye six pounds of cotton a deep blue. After it is done, you may put in as much more, and it will dye a pale blue. To Keep Apples in Winter. Pick them carefully, so as not to bruise them; put them in an out-house, exposed to the north, either in boxes, or barrels, or lying in heaps; after they have been several weeks in this situation, pick them over and put them in barrels which