190 NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE, 



must be flung into water, and kept there, for otherwise they 

 will dry and shrink, and the peel will not run. At first a 

 person would find it no easy matter to divest a rush of its 

 peel or rind, so as to leave one regular, narrow, even rib 

 from top to bottom that may support the pith ; but this, 

 like other feats, soon becomes familiar even to children ; 

 and we have seen an old woman, stone blind, performing 

 this business with great dispatch, and seldom failing to 

 strip them with the nicest regularity. When these Junci 

 are thus far prepared, they must lie out on the grass to be 

 bleached, and take the dew for some nights, and afterwards 

 be dried in the sun. 



Some address is required in dipping these rushes in the 

 scalding fat or grease ; but this knack also is to be attained 

 by practice. The careful wife of an industrious Hampshire 

 labourer obtains all her fat for nothing, for she saves the 

 scummings of her bacon-pot for this use ; and if the grease 

 abounds with salt, she causes the salt to precipitate to the 

 bottom by setting the scummings in a warm oven. Where 

 hogs are not much in use, and especially by the sea-side, the 

 coarser animal-oils will come very cheap. A pound of 

 common grease may be procured for fourpence, and about 

 six pounds of grease will dip a pound of rushes, and one 

 pound of rushes may be bought for one shilling ; so that a 

 pound of rushes, medicated and ready for use, will cost 

 three shillings. If men that keep bees will mix a little 

 wax with the grease, it will give it a consistency, and ren- 

 der it more cleanly, and make the rushes burn longer; 

 mutton-suet would have the same effect. 



A good rush, which measured in length two feet four 

 inches and a-half, being minuted, burnt only three minutes 

 short of an hour ; and a rush of still greater length has 

 been known to burn one hour and a-quarter. 



Jk 



