Preserve the backs of old letters to write upon.

If you have children who are learning to write, buy coarse white paper by the quantity, and make it up into writing-books. This does not cost half so much as it does to buy them ready made at the stationer's.

See that nothing is thrown away which might have served to nourish your own family or a poorer one.

As far as possible, have pieces of bread eaten up before they become hard: spread those that are not eaten, and let them dry, to be pounded for puddings, or soaked for brewis.

Brewis is made of crusts and dry pieces of bread, soaked a good while in hot milk, mashed up, and eaten with salt. Above all, do not let crusts accumulate in such quantities that they cannot be used. With proper care, there is no need of losing a particle of bread.

All the Mending in the house should be done once a week if possible.

If it be not possible to do it in your own family, hire some one to come to the house and work with them.

A warming-pan full of coals, or a shovel of coals, held over varnished furniture, will take out white spots. Care should be taken not to hold the pan near enough to scorch; the place to which heat has thus been applied, should be rubbed with a flannel while warm.

Sal-Volatile or hartshorn will restore colours taken out by acid. It may be dropped upon any garment without doing harm.

New iron should be very gradually heated at first. After it has become inured to the heat, it is not as likely to crack.

Clean a brass kettle, before using it for cooking, with salt and vinegar.

The oftener carpets are shaken the longer they wear; the dirt that collects under them grinds out the threads.

All linen rags should be saved, for they are useful in sickness. If they have become dirty and worn by cleaning silver, &c., wash them and scrape them into lint.

If you are troubled to get soft water for washing, fill a tub or barrel half full of wood ashes, and fill it up with water, so that you may have ley whenever you want it. A gallon of strong ley, put into a great kettle of hard water, will make it as soft as rain water. Some people use pearlash, or potash; but this costs something, and is very apt to injure the texture of the cloth.

Do not let knives be dropped into hot dish-water. It is a good plan to have a large tin pot to wash them in, just high enough to wash the blades

the handles.

It is better to accomplish perfectly a very small amount of work, than to half do ten times as much.

Charcoal Powder will be found a very good thing to give knives a first-rate polish.

A bonnet and trimmings may be worn a much longer time, if the dust be brushed well off after walking.

Much knowledge may be obtained by the good housewife observing how things are managed in well-regulated families.

Apples intended for dumplings should not have the core taken out of them, as the pips impart a delicious flavour to the dumpling.

A rice pudding is excellent without either eggs or sugar, if baked gently: it keeps better without eggs.

Do not cook a fresh joint whilst any of the last remains uneaten —hash it up, and with gravy and a little management, eke out another day's dinner.

The shanks of mutton make a good stock for nearly any kind of gravy, and they are very cheap—a dozen may be had for a penny, enough to make a quart of delicious soup.

Thick curtains, closely drawn around the bed, are very injurious, because they not only confine the effluvia thrown off from our bodies whilst in bed, but interrupt the current of pure air.

Regularity in the payment of accounts is essential to housekeeping. All tradesmen's bills should be paid weekly, for then any errors can be detected whilst the transactions are fresh in the memory.

Allowing children to talk incessantly is a mistake. We do not mean to say that they should be restricted from talking in proper seasons, but they should be taught to know when it is proper for them to cease.

Beat well the yolks of two eggs and the white of one: mix a tablespoonful of gin and a teaspoonful of sugar, thicken it with ivory black, add it to the eggs, and use as common blacking; the seats or cushions being left a day or two to harden. This is good for dress boots and shoes

Bruised galls, one pound; logwood, two pounds; green vitriol, half a pound; water, five quarts. Boil for two hours, and strain. Use to restore the colour of black cloth.

Special preparations of paint, styled "enamel," are now made, suitable for both useful and decorative purposes—garden stands, indoor furniture or ornaments, baths, &c. They are ready mixed in a variety of shades, can be easily applied, and dry with a hard glossy surface.

In compiling this part of our hints, we have endeavoured to supply that kind of information which is so often wanted in the time of need, and cannot be obtained when a medical man or a druggist is not near. The doses are all fixed for adults, unless otherwise specified. The various remedies are arranged in sections, according to their uses, as being more easy for reference,

Dissolve half a drachm of alum in eight ounces (half a pint) of water.

as astringent wash. When twice as much alum and only half the quantity of water are used, it acts as a discutient, but not as an eye-water.

that this and the following washes are for

only.

Add half an ounce of diluted acetic acid to three ounces of decoction of poppy heads.

as anodyne wash.

Dissolve alum and white vitriol, of each one drachm, in one pint of water, and filter through paper.

as astringent wash.

Dissolve white vitriol and acetate of lead, of each seven grains, in four ounces of elder-flower water; add one drachm of laudanum (tincture of opium), and the same quantity of spirit of camphor, then strain.

as detergent wash.

Dissolve half a drachm of white vitriol in five ounces of water. Dissolve two scruples of acetate of lead in five ounces of water. Mix these solutions, then set aside for a short time, and afterwards filter.

as astringent wash; this forms a most valuable collyrium.

Dissolve twenty grains of white vitriol in a pint of water or rose water.

for weak eyes.

Dissolve a scruple of white vitriol in ten ounces of water; add one drachm of spirit of camphor, and strain.

as a stimulant.

Dissolve fifteen grains of white vitriol in eight ounces of camphor water (

), and the same quantity of decoction of poppy heads.

as anodyne and detergent wash: it is useful for weak eyes.

are used as vehicles for the administration of more active medicines, and

are made for the purpose of rendering some remedies palatable. Both should be kept in closely covered jars.