496 STANDARD RECEIPTS. 



10. A Parisian paper recommends the following method for the pre- 

 servation of eggs: dissolve four ounces of beeswax in eight ounces of 

 warm olive oil; in this put the tip of the finger and annoint the egg all 

 around. The oil will immediately be absorbed, and the shell and pores 

 filled up by the wax. If kept in a cool place the eggs after two years, 

 will be as good as if fresh laid. 



1 1 . An old sea captain says: ' 'The week before going to sea, on a four 

 months' voyage, I gathered in sixty dozens of eggs for cabin sea-stores, 

 taking special pains to prove every egg of the lot a good one; besides, I 

 bought them of my farmer friends, and know thej^ were all fresh. Then 

 I fixed them for keeping, by taking five or six dozens at a time in a bas- 

 ket, and dipping them about five seconds in the cook's "copper" of 

 boiling water. After scalding, I passed the eggs through a bath, made 

 by dissolving about five pounds of the cheapest brown sugar in a gallon 

 of water, and laid them out on the galley floor to dry. There I had my 

 sixty dozens of eggs sugar-coated. I packed them in charcoal dust in- 

 stead of salt; I tried salt ten years, and I don't believe it preserves eggs 

 a mite. The steward had strict orders to report everj' bad egg he should 

 find. During the voyage he brought three, not absolutely spoiled, but 

 a little old. All the others, or what was left of them, were as fresh 

 when we came in as they were when I packed them away." 



SOAP AND SOAP MAKING. 



How to Make Soap. Animal fat, such as tallow, is the sub- 

 stance most at hand of all fatty matter for soap-making, although 

 vegetable oils, such as castor, sunflower, olive and other oils, and also 

 resin, are used in soap making occasionally, but tallow being more eas- 

 ily obtainable, and generally at a lower cost than any of the oils above 

 enumerated, is most extensively employed in the manufacture of domes- 

 tic soap. 



For this purpose the grease after being freed of skin, by boiling, 

 straining, and remelting, is heated to the temperature of boiling water] 

 and mixed on the fire with a hot solution of either soda, potash,''orboth' 

 in water called the lye; the whole is gradually transferred into' an iron 

 pot, larger by at least one third than the whole mixture about one 

 quart of the melted fat being first ladled into it, then as much or more 

 of the hot lye, the mixture constantly stirred on the fire till a sort of 

 creamy matter is formed, the ladling kept on alternately till all the fat 



