EECIPES AND XOTABILIA. 501 



Then comes the fire to work, and kinc illce lachrymce. 

 The sun, if you can make use of him, is a much safer 

 medium ; turn the boots down as far as you can, prop 

 them open with sticks, and let the sun's rays strike down 

 into them. Never allow your mackintoshes to be hung up 

 on a peg, for more mackintoshes are spoilt by this plan 

 than by all the wear you can give them. The peg point 

 cracks the rubber by stretching it, and a new mackintosh 

 is often rendered leaky in one night. Even if hung up 

 by the loop, which is appended to them for that purpose, 

 there is a heavy drag upon two points, which will, sooner 

 or later, produce the same result. I always spread mine 

 over a chair back, or fold up and put it away in a cup- 

 board when not wanted. Never mind what water-proofers 

 say about hanging up. Repairing is their business, and 

 wearing out is yours. Many a time have I got wet through 

 with a nearly new mackintosh, and from no other reason 

 than a minute peg split, not bigger than a pin's point. 



Dry Lines. All lines and nets after using should be 

 spread out, or hung up, to dry. A trolling or fly line can 

 be unwound, and either wound round the back of a chair 

 or laid upon the sideboard in loose coils ; but by no means 

 put them away in the least damp, or when you use them 

 again they will be found to be perfectly rotten and 

 useless. 



To preserve Gut, Silk, Tinsel, &c. Neither keep it in 

 too dry or rather warm a place, lest it become brittle, nor 

 in a damp place, where it will become rotten. Do not 

 expose it either to the air more than possible or to the 

 sun, for light appears to have a very deleterious effect upon 

 gut and silk ; a hank of gut exposed in a shop- window 

 speedily gets rotten and unreliable. I usually coil the 

 gut and wrap it in a piece of flannel and put it away in 

 a box till required. The same may be said of tying silks 

 precisely, while tinsel must be kept in the dark to pre- 

 serve its colour. It may be partially restored by wetting 



