Directions For Washing Calicoes Recipe

Calico clothes, before they are put in water, should have the grease

spots rubbed out, as they cannot be seen when the whole of the garment

is wet. They should never be washed in very hot soap suds; that which is

mildly warm will cleanse them quite as well, and will not extract the

colors so much. Soft soap should never be used for calicoes, excepting

for the various shades of yellow, which look the best washed with soft

soap, and not rinsed in fair water. Other colors should be rinsed in

fair water, and dried in the shade. When calicoes incline to fade, the

colors can be set by washing them in lukewarm water, with beef's gall,

in the proportion of a tea-cup full to four or five gallons of water.

Rinse them in fair water--no soap is necessary, without the clothes are

very dirty. If so, wash them in lukewarm suds, after they have been

first rubbed out in beef's gall water. The beef's gall can be kept

several months, by squeezing it out of the skin in which it is enclosed,

adding salt to it, and bottled and corked tight. The water that potatoes

has been boiled in is an excellent thing to wash black calicoes in. When

there are many black garments to wash in a family, it is a good plan to

save, during the week, all the water in which potatoes are boiled. The

following method is said to set the colors of calicoes so that they will

not fade by subsequent washing: Infuse three gills of salt in four

quarts of boiling water; put in the calicoes, (which should be perfectly

clean; if not so, the dirt will be set.) Let the calicoes remain in till

the water is cold. I have never seen this tried, but I think it not

improbable that it may be an excellent way to set the colors, as rinsing

calicoes in cold salt and water serves to set the colors, particularly

of black, blue, and green colors. A little vinegar in the rinsing water

of pink, red, and green calicoes, is good to brighten the colors, and

keep them from mixing. All kinds of calicoes but black, look better for

starching, but black calicoes will not look clear if starched. On this

account potato water is an excellent thing to wash them, if boiled down

to a thick consistence, as it stiffens them without showing.