_Grease spots._--If the article may be washed, try washing it with cold water and white soap.
Or, moisten it with a strong solution of household ammonia and water, cover with blotting paper and iron dry.
Or, sponge with a mixture of four parts alcohol to one part salt.
Powdered French chalk will often remove grease spots from silk or woollen materials.
Tar, carriage grease or machine-oil may usually be removed by rubbing the material with lard and then thoroughly washing it with soap and water.
Spots of candle grease will disappear if they are covered with blotting paper or coarse fibred brown paper and ironed with a hot iron.
_Kerosene._--Kerosene spilled on books, rugs or furniture will quickly disappear if they are held near a hot fire or a gas jet. Not nearer than your hand can bear. Sometimes if the article is left in strong sunshine all day, the spots will disappear.
_Blood stains._--Wash first with clear cold water.
If the stain is obstinate wet with kerosene, then wash in warm suds.
_Stained hands._--They are improved by the application of any of the following: vinegar, lemon juice, pumice, ripe tomatoes or dishwater.
_Note._--Colour taken out by an acid can usually be restored with an alkali. Colour taken out with an alkali can usually be restored with an acid.
_Ants._--Powdered borax sprinkled on shelves and along baseboards and door sills will keep ants away.
Ants will not walk over broad, thick chalk lines. Such lines drawn round boxes and jars some distance above the shelf or floor on which they stand will protect them from ants.
Ants and other crawling insects may be kept out of a cupboard which stands on legs, if its legs are set in bowls or cans of water.
To wash cupboards and shelves with a strong solution of alum and water (1 lb. to 2 qts.) is a protection against any kind of insect.
_Mice._--An excellent defense against mice is a velvet-footed, self-possessed, Epicurean Philosopher in the shape of a cat.
Traps are good if one may not have a cat.
Seek diligently for holes large enough to admit mice and have them stopped. If you discover one unexpectedly and have nothing else at hand, thrust a piece of yellow soap into the hole. I have not yet found among mice the counterpart of the gentleman who cleaned his teeth with yellow soap for the sake of self-discipline.