Page:Mrs Beeton's Book of Household Management.djvu/2018

1812 the process. Tea-leaves also may be used with advantage upon druggets and short-piled carpets. Light sweeping and soft brooms are desirable. Many a carpet is prematurely worn out by injudicious sweeping. In sweeping thick-piled carpets, such as Axminster and Turkey carpets, always brush the way of the pile: by so doing they may be kept clean for years; but if the broom is used in a different way, all the dust will enter the carpet and soon spoil it.

This can hardly be well done without the aid of a proper carpet-fork or stretcher, which may be purchased for about ''2s. 6d.'' at any ironmonger's. Work the carpet the length way of the material, which ought to be made up the length way of the room. Nail one end all along, but do not nail the sides as you go along until you are quite sure that the carpet is full stretched, and that there is no ruck anywhere in the length of it.

Carpets in bedrooms and stair-carpets may be kept clean by being brushed with a soft hair-brush frequently, and, as occasion requires, being taken up and shaken. Larger carpets should be swept carefully with a whisk-brush or hand-brush of hair, which is far better, especially in the case of fine-piled carpets. Thick carpets, as Axminster and Turkey, should always be brushed one way. Grease spots can be removed from carpets by means of a paste made of boiling water poured on equal quantities of magnesia and fuller's-earth. This paste, while hot, must be placed upon the grease spots and brushed off when quite dry. When carpets are very dirty, they may be washed in the following manner:—To every 2 gallons of boiling water add 1 oz. of yellow soap and 1 drachm of soda. With a clean flannel wash the carpet well with the liquid; do a small piece at a time and rinse well with clean hot water. When all has been gone over, the carpet should be left to dry. The colours will be greatly improved by afterwards rubbing over with a clean flannel dipped in a strong solution of ox-gall and water.

Melt 1 lb. of yellow soap and ½ a lb. of soda in an oven; then mix them well in a gallon of water to which add 1 oz. of nitric acid. With a clean scrub-brush wash the carpet well from seam to seam with this mixture, and rinse it off quickly with clean soft water. Do only a small piece of carpet at the time, and rub dry with a clean cloth as much as is washed.

Let the carpets first be well beaten and brushed to free them from all dust and dirt. Then scour them quickly with a solution of ox-gall, which will both extract grease and refresh the colours. One pint of gall