LXVlll.j 
OF SELBORNE. 
195 
hedges. These rushes are in best condition in the height of 
summer ; hut may be gatliered, so as to serve the purpose well, 
quite on to autumn. It woukl be needless to add that the 
largest and longest are best. Decayed labourers, women, and 
children, make it their business to procure and prepare them. 
As soon as they are cut they must be flung into the 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 despatch, and seldom failing to strip them 
with the nicest regularity. When these junci are thus far pre- 
pared, 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 scum- 
mings 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 l)y the sea-side, the coarser animal- 
oils will come very cheajD. 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 render it more cleanly, and make the rushes 
burn longer ; mutton^uet 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 still of greater length has been known to 
burn one hour and a quarter. 
These rushes give a good clear light. Watch-lights (coated 
^^■lth tallo\\'), it is true, shed a dismal one, " darkness visible " 
o 2 
