234 ^^^ ^<^^' ^ '^P COHASSE T. 



In later years two pounds of potash in dark-colored 

 pieces were purchased at the store and put into the melted 

 fat. This potash was dangerous stuff to handle. A man 

 in Scituate, while breaking some pieces for his wife to use, 

 made a piece fly into his eye and he lost his sight. Into 

 the melted grease the lye was poured a little at a time, 

 some one stirring the hot mass continuously for all one 

 day and a part of the next with a long stick. The stick, 

 usually of apple tree, was a sort of mascot, for good luck 

 in soap making was not at everybody's bidding. Too 

 much or too little lye or some unknown defect would 

 easily spoil the soap. This uncertain behavior gave rise 

 to witch stories, and a certain woman in Beechwood was 

 accused of bewitching people's soap. To drive her out of 

 the soap a black-handled butcher knife was once stabbed 

 into the soap, and the soap-maker claimed that it cut off 

 the witch's ear, so that she wore a shawl over her head ever 

 afterwards to conceal the wound. 



But witches aside, the soap, if made successfully, be- 

 came a shiny amber and gray mass poured into a wooden 

 trough, where it thickened upon cooling till it became ropy 

 or even waxy. 



A barrel of ashes made a half barrel of soap, and it 

 was used for laundry or bathing or scrubbing, or for any- 

 thing that needed soap. 



Next to soap making an interesting process which pre- 

 vailed in every home was candle making. Tallow "dips" 

 were used for many generations until tin molds came into 

 use. 



A row of flax wicks dangling from a stick were dipped 

 into melted tallow. Some of the tallow would harden 

 upon the wicks, then a second dip would catch more tal- 

 low. So by many dippings the candles would grow thicker 

 until they reached the required size, a little thicker at the 

 bottom, of course, as any stalagmite would be. A few 

 hundred could be made at the same time if tallow enough 

 was at hand. 



