To Make Nice Crayons for Blackboards

These directions are given by Prof. Turner, of the American Asylum for the Deaf and Dumb, as follows:

• Take 5 pounds of Paris white, 1 pound of Wheat flour, wet with water, and knead it well; make it so stiff that it will not stick to the table, but not so stiff as to crumble and fall to pieces when it is rolled under the hand.
  
• To roll our the crayons to the proper size, two boards are needed, one to roll them on; the other to roll them with. The first should be a smooth pine board three feet long and nine inches wide. The other should also be pine, a foot long and nine inches wide, having nailed on the under side near each edge a slip of wood one-third of an inch thick, in order to raise it so much above the under board as that the crayon, when brought to its proper size, may lie between them without being flattened.
  
• The mass is rolled into a ball, and slices are cut from one side of it about one-third of an inch thick: these slices are again cut into strips about four inches long and one-third of an inch wide, and rolled separately between these boards until smooth and round.
  
• Near at hand should be another board 3 feet long and 4 inches wide, across which each crayon, as it is made, should be laid, so that the ends may project on each side--the crayons should be laid in close contact, and straight. When the board is filled, the ends should all be trimmed off so as to make the crayons as long as the width of the board. It is then laid in the sun, if in hot weather, or if in winter, near a stove or fireplace, where the crayons may dry gradually, which will require twelve hours. When thoroughly dry they are fit for use.

An experienced hand will make 150 in an hour." Young boys can make them and sell to their companions.

Poisons and Antidotes

The following list of antidotes is given as reliable in cases of poisoning, to which all are in danger of being subjected some time, when, perhaps, no medical skill or experienced advice is within reach. It would be well for every family to have something like this, which they can turn to at a moment's warning.

The following are some of the more common poisons and the remedies most likely to be at hand in case of need.

The directions may be old, but in case you happen to get a good, strong dose of poison down, you will not object to a cure on account of age.

• Acids.--These cause great heat and a sensation of burning pain from the mouth down to the stomach. Remedies: magnesia, soda, pearlash, or soap dissolved in water, then use the stomach-pump or an emetic.
  
• Alkalies.--Best remedy is vinegar.
  
• Ammonia.--Remedy: lemon-juice or vinegar.
  
• Alcohol.--First cleanse the stomach by an emetic, then dash cold water on the head, and ammonia (spirits of hartshorn).
  
• Arsenic.--Remedies: in the first place evacuate the stomach, then give the white of eggs, lime-water, or chalk and water, charcoal, and a preparation of iron, particularly hydrate.
  
• Lead, White Lead, and Sugar of Lead.--Remedies: alum, cathartics, such as castor oil and Epsom salts, specially sulphuric acid lemonade.
  
• Charcoal.--In poisons by carbonic gas, remove the patient into the open air, dash cold water on the head and body, and stimulate the nostrils and lungs by hartshorn, at the same time rubbing the chest briskly.
  
• Corrosive Sublimate.--Give the white of eggs, freely mixed with water, or give wheat flour and water, or soap and water, freely.
  
• Creasote.--White of eggs and emetics.
  
• Belladonna (Night Henbane).--Give an emetic, then plenty of vinegar and water, or lemonade.
  
• Mushrooms, when Poisonous.--Give an emetic, plenty of vinegar and water, with doses of ether, if handy.
  
• Nitrate of Silver (Lunar Caustic).--Give a strong solution of common salt, and then emetics.
  
• Opium.--First give a strong emetic of mustard and water, then strong coffee and acid drinks; dash cold water on the head.
  
• Laudanum.--Same as opium.
  
• Nux Vomica.--First give emetics, then brandy.
  
• Oxalic Acid (frequently mistaken for Epsom salts).--Remedies: chalk, magnesia, or soap and water, and other soothing drinks.
  
• Prussic Acid.--When there is time, administer chlorine in the shape of soda and lime; hot brandy and water, hartshorn, and turpentine are also useful.
  
• Snake Bites, etc.--Apply immediately strong hartshorn, and take internally; also give sweet oil and stimulate freely; apply a ligature tight above the part bitten, and then apply a cupping-glass.
  
• Tartar Emetic.--Give large doses of tea made of galls, Peruvian bark, or white oak bark.
  
• Verdigris.--Plenty of white of eggs and water.
  
• White Vitriol.--Give the patient plenty of milk and water.
  
• Melted Lard.--An antidote for strychnine, nux vomica, wild cherry, and nightshade.
  
• Tea of the Sensitive Plant for the bite of a rattle-snake.

To Prepare Shad for Broiling

Scale your shad perfectly, clean it nicely, then split it down the back, and lay it flat on your board or tray; now remove the entrails perfectly, taking care not to break the gall. Wash out all the blood, and lay your shad in clean water till you are ready to place it over the fire.

To Prepare a Shad for Breakfast

First, with a sharp knife, remove all the bones from your shad, sprinkle it with salt and a little Cayenne pepper, after which dredge on a thin coat of flour. Have ready a greased tin sheet (not a pan), lay on it your shad, and put it in your stove or oven; let it brown slowly, and when done slip it carefully off the tin sheet to a hot dish. Butter it well, and serve it immediately.

To Broil a Fresh Shad

Grease your gridiron, put your shad on it, over bright coals for five minutes, just to give it the taste of the fire, then transfer it to a tin sheet, and having dredged on flour, pour on a large spoonful of melted butter, and bake.

Diarrhea

• Cut up a dozen green persimmons with an ounce of red oak bark,
• boil these in a pint of water till reduced one - half,
• add one ounce of gum Arabic and
• half a pound of white sugar.

Boil the mixture with a teacupful of the syrup from black-berry preserves down to a stiff candy.

Sift coarse white sugar on a clean sheet of white paper, and drop the candy on it in the form of lozenges.

Let the patient eat three or four each day.

A Cancer Cure

• Pound up a handful of sorrel leaves,
• Stew them with lard,

Apply the poultice to the cancer, taking care to protect the well flesh by means of a large piece of adhesive plaster with a round hole cut in the center just sufficiently large to expose the cancer.

This poultice should remain twenty-four hours.

Strong potash, applied in the same way, it is said, will destroy a cancer so that it can be pulled out as you would pull up a parsnip from the ground.

Cure for the Bite of a Mad Dog

Elecampane is a plant well known to most persons, and is to be found in many of our gardens. Immediately after being bitten, take

• one and a half ounces of the root of the plant,--the green root is perhaps preferable, but the dried will answer,
• slice or bruise,
• put into a pint of fresh milk,
• boil down to a half pint, strain, and when cold drink, fasting for at least six hours afterward.

The next morning, fasting, repeat the dose, using two ounces of the root. On the third morning take another dose prepared as the last, and this will be sufficient. It is recommended that after each dose nothing be eaten for at least six hours.

Important Medical Discovery

A remarkable medical discovery has recently been made in the treatment of deafness, by Professor Scott, of the New York Medical University, by which the most apparently hopeless cases are radically cured. The method consists in introducing atomized oxide of phenol directly into the cavity of the tympanum. No unpleasant sensations are produced, and a feeling of clearness seems to follow the application. Numerous cases are daily treated successfully at the university.