RURAL NEW-YORKER 
107» 
Simple Science 
By Dr. F. D. Crane 
What is Stickiness ? 
Question for Dr. Crane if not too 
trifling; Why are some substances 
sticky and others not? Q. n. F. 
No, not too trifling, too difficult. No 
one knows why things are sticky or 
what stickiness is. A great deal of very 
careful work has been and will be done 
on this subject, for it has a direct bear¬ 
ing on the great problem of the consti¬ 
tution of matter and is very important 
in industrial chemisti-y (ore separation 
by flotation and washing clothes, for 
instance). A column could be filled 
with the moi'e important facts and 
some of the theories, but they are not 
worth the space, so little is really 
kn(nvn about the matter. f. d. c. 
California Beer; Sugar Syrup 
1. How can I make “California beer?” 
I think it is made from some kind of 
seeds and yeast. 2. How can I make a 
syrup from sugar that will not granu¬ 
late? 
Valley Forge, Pa. i>. h. w. 
1. We never befoi’e heard of the Cali¬ 
fornia product, and can get no trace of it. 
T'erhaps some California reader can tell 
us. 
2. The simple syrup of the pharmacist 
is about 85 per cent, cane sugar and 
stands up pretty well. The addition of 
small amounts of the simpler sugars, 
which themselves crystallize with diffi¬ 
culty, helps keep the cane sugar in solu¬ 
tion. This end can be reached by adding 
a little cream of tartar while boiling the 
syrup, or by adding directly some glu- 
(•ose syrup, or starch sugar. F. D. C. 
Making Newspaper Pulp 
(’an you tell me the correct method of 
jeducing newspapers to pulp? 
New York. o. E. w. A. 
Wet them and stir. That is what 
the people do who handle them by the 
tons per day. Pi’evious shredding, warm 
water and a trace of lye will help along, 
Imt water and stirring are all that is 
needed. F. n. c. 
Removing Rust Spots 
How can I remove rust spots? I have 
tried lemon juice and salt in vain. 
Pennsylvania. L. N. 
Try oxalic acid, remembering it is a 
pretty active poison. If they still stick, 
try glacial acetic acid, if that fails try 
strong hydrochloric acid in an equal 
volume of water. Put on these acid.s 
for a moment at a time, rinse with 
water, put on again, rinse, and so on. 
After the acids wash well in rather 
strong baking soda solution in water, 
if that seems to bring back the spot, 
put on acid again, and so on, finishing 
with soda and then rinse in water till 
the cloth is tasteless. If it is colored 
goods the case is apt to be hopeless 
unless you can touch the rust spot only. 
F. D. c. 
Effect^of Soap on Varnish 
What effect do soda and potash soap.s 
have on a varnished surface? n. G. f. 
No one can tell in advance, as there 
are all sorts of varnishes and all sorts 
of soaps, with more or less free alkali, 
and various fillers and detergents. In 
general, the better the varnish and the 
milder the teoap the less the solvent 
action will be, but even “spar” varnishes 
are affected somewhat by water. 
F. D. C. 
Dyeing a Horse 
On page 90G you write about dyeing 
the horse. 'Wliat chemicals shall I use 
and how shall I mix them? I am not a 
horse jockey. s. M. K. 
Oregon. 
Qviite so, and neither are we, and, 
while it is easy, from chemical stand¬ 
point. to dye liorse hair, the formulas 
at hand assume that it has been re¬ 
moved from the horse and are written 
accerdingly. 
The only safe one, after specifying 
that the hair shall be washed entirely 
free from fat and oil, says to soak for 
12 houi's in a limewater extract of 
logwood chips at 120 degrees F. to get 
a dark brown, and, as this is not un¬ 
comfortably hot, a well scrubbed spot 
might be kept wet for some hours with 
cloths taken from the kettle of warm 
dye. Brazil wood chips tire also men¬ 
tioned, but with a mordant _ (i. e. to 
“se*‘” the dye) of tin chloride, which 
world be rather irritating to the skin 
unless quickly washed off. yet, as this 
is supposed to give your favorite chest¬ 
nut, it might be worth a trial on a 
patient and unsuspicious horse. But it 
is hard to see how you could cover 
very much of the beast, and at^ best it 
would last but one coat of hair, 
So much for the chemistry. We are 
willing to bet that this item will be 
read by some elderly man seated on a 
nail keg where an occa.sional soft whin¬ 
ny can be heard, and he will slowly 
wink one eye, and remark that “Tliat 
there chemist feller don’t know much.” 
He will be right; there are ways t»f 
coloring horse hair without troubling 
the living owner which do not get into 
print very often, and if any wise—well, 
let us say equine instructor, demonstra¬ 
tor and exchanger wishes to tell us 
something, we shall be glad to hear 
from him. v. n. v. 
Sulphured Apples 
“Sulphured apples” are not dried but, 
after being peeled and quartered, are 
exposed to the fumes of burning sulphur 
for some hours and then packed in 
crocks in a cool place. Pie made with 
them taste almost as if fresh apples had 
been used, but, are they harmle.ss? 
PeiinsyP-ania. u, F. ar. 
The sulphur gas, which is sulphur 
dioxide, kills all the germs of decay it 
touches and slightly tans the surface, 
which is also a little dried. Some may 
stay as sulphite, but it mostly goes to 
sulphate, setting free traces of the fruit 
acids. There has been quite a bit of a 
fight around this sulphureil fruit mat¬ 
ter but, to a chemist on the outside, the 
•Reproduced from New York Evening Telegram 
fat hand of “big business” seemed much 
of the time to be pulling the strings. 
The present opinion is changing to the 
harmlessness of sulphured fruit in gen¬ 
eral, and if you will wash before using 
in very weak baking soda solution, and 
take care that no slightly spoiled fruit 
is used, I cannot see how any harm <an 
come from using apples so preserved. 
F. D. c. 
Frozen Parships 
In reading an article. “Fighting the 
Kaiser in the Kitchen,” in a recent maga¬ 
zine, I notice the following statement: 
“The parsnip stays in the ground to no 
end save that of poisoning someone next 
Spring..” Is there, in your opinion, any¬ 
thing to 'this? My family and myself 
are very fond of this vegetable in the 
Spring, after it has stayed in the ground 
all Winter, and I had supposed that 
the freezing improved the flavor with¬ 
out the liability of the parsnips becom¬ 
ing poisonous. F, E. 0. 
Massachusetts. 
The statement i.s merely another 
sample of the’ blat emitted by those who 
know’ .so little of the real wonders of 
nature that they have to tdepend on 
“snap” and “pep” in their stuff to “get 
it across,” as they would say. The 
parsnip has no more idea of poisoning 
a person than a tree has of being made 
into a TJ-boat chaser, it is a storehouse 
of sta’-ch and sugar against the day 
when it will want to run up a big stem 
in a hurry to make its .seeds, which is 
its true end. That stem, and the leaves, 
are poisonous, but moderately, and 
many people are not affected, but the 
poison is there, just as the spines are 
on a chestnut, to protect the seeds. 
What poison is in the roots is destroyed 
by cooking. It is said that those w’ho 
have tried them raw have been poisoned, 
but the world is better without those 
W’ho would eat raw parsnips, anyway. 
F. n. c. ‘ 
“ Chemical to Sweeten Pork ” 
I ludjce in “Simple ScienGe.” on 
page 895, an inquiry by F. H. C. on a 
“Chemical to Sw’eeten Pork,” and the 
answer by F. D. C. I accidentally, in 
an experiment, learned of the value of 
“concentrated lye” in a case of that kind 
and will give it to others who might 
wish to try it. Take for a bath suf¬ 
ficient fresh clean w’ater to cover your 
meat W'ell, and put in it enough con¬ 
centrated lye to give a pronounced lye 
taste to the w’ater, being careful to 
have it well dissolved. Put your meat 
of whatever kind you may wish to treat 
into it, leaving it for 15 or 20 minutes, 
or even longer if deemed necessarj-, 
then wash the meat thoroughly in clear 
Continued on page 108.S. 
That Roofs a Wonder I 
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around here! 
“And it stands to reason that it will resist fire, wind, and weather 
like slate, because the surface is real slate! 
“Yet it costs no more than a roof of high-grade wooden shingles. 
“How’s that for a combination? 
“It is one of the best roofings Barrett ever put out, and Barrett 
has been a pioneer in the roofing business for over fifty years.” 
All this is so. We have taken high-grade felt and bituminous 
waterproofing cement and into the surface we have embedded, 
while it was still hot, small particles of red or green slate. By using 
small particles of slate instead of costly slate slabs, we have given 
you a roof at a mere fraction of the cost of a slate roof. 
We have also reduced the cost to you by making Multi-Shingles 
in strips of four shingles in one, so that you can lay them four 
times as fast as ordinary wood or slate shingles. 
The next time you go to town visit your dealer and ask him to show 
you this remarkable roof, and you will agree that here’s a wonder I 
Be sure to send for special Multi-Shingle Booklet. 
Everlastic Tylike Shingles 
For those who prefer the customary method of laying shingles, but who want 
to secure the beauty and durability offered by the Everlastic slate-surfacing pro¬ 
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made of the same material as Ever¬ 
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shingles 8 inches wide by 12% inches long, 
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The best ""and most 
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Carbosota Creosote Oil 
^^ 1 -^ You can add many 
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Oil. Being in liquid 
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Elastigum Water¬ 
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Wherever there is a 
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gum. It has a hundred 
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flashings around chim¬ 
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free upon request. 
