Page:Scouting for girls, adapted from Girl guiding.djvu/180

166 pulling it through, thread it with the wool. This patching is excellent for table-linen.

I once had an aunt who was a thorough old Scout, and was rather proud of her mending, and she always said that she didn't mind what colored cotton you gave her to sew with, because her stitches hardly ever showed, they were so small, and also she put them inside the stuff. If she was putting on a patch to blue stuff, she could do it with red cotton, and you would never have noticed it on the right side; her stitches were all under the edge. Or else she sewed it at the back, on the " wrong " side, so that it looked perfectly neat.

If you are not able to match the wool for a darn, it is a good plan to use the ravellings of the stuff itself. Sometimes, away in the country, you can't go to shop and you have nothing like the piece you want to mend. A Scout would turn it inside out and undo a little of the hem and ravel out the edge. Suppose you were to cut a hole in the front of your blue serge skirt; if you darn it with the ravellings of the turnings of the seam or the hem, that will be exactly the same color and the same thickness as your dress. No wool you could buy would match as well. Or if you want to mend a jersey or knitted gloves, you never could buy such a good match—the same sized wools and the tints.

HOW TO DEAL WITH FIRES AND ACCIDENTS

Fire.—If you discover a house on fire you should—


 * 1st—Alarm the people inside.