560.  Colouring for cheese

The colouring for cheese is, or at least should be, Spanish arnotto; but as soon as colouring became general in this country, a colour of an adulterated kind was exposed for sale in almost every shop; the weight of a guinea and a half of real Spanish arnotto is sufficient for a cheese of fifty pounds’ weight.  If a considerable part of the cream of the night’s milk be taken for butter, more colouring will be requisite.  The leaner the cheese is, the more colouring it requires.  The manner of using arnotto is to tie up, in a linen rag, the quantity deemed sufficient, and put into half a pint of warm water over night.  This infusion is put into the tub of milk, in the morning, with the rennet infusion; dipping the rag into the milk, and rubbing it against the palm of the hand as long as any colour runs out.

561.  To sharpen edge tools

Take equal parts of flour of emery and crocus; make into a paste with sweet oil; have now a piece of buck-skin, (hemlock tan,) tack it by each end on a piece of board, with the grain uppermost; then on this spread a little of the paste, and sharpen your tools on it.  You will, indeed, be astonished at the effect.  Try it.

562.  Blue composition for dyeing

Take equal parts of vitriol and indigo; powder them very finely, separately, and mix.

563.  To gild letters on vellum or paper

Letters written on vellum or paper are gilded in three ways; in the first, a little size is mixed with the ink, and the letters are written as usual; when they are dry, a slight degree of stickiness is produced by breathing on them, upon which the gold leaf is immediately applied, and by a little pressure may be made to adhere with sufficient firmness.  In the second method, some white lead of chalk is ground up with strong size, and the letters are made with this by means of a brush; when the mixture is almost dry, the gold leaf may be laid on, and afterwards burnished.  The last method is to mix up some gold powder with size, and make the letters of this by means of a brush.

564.  To preserve strawberry plants

Sir Joseph Banks, from a variety of experiments, and the experience of many years, recommends a general revival of the now almost obsolete practice of laying straw under strawberry plants, when the fruit begins to swell; by which means the roots are shaded from the sun, the waste of moisture by evaporation prevented, the leaning fruit kept from damage by resting on the ground, particularly in wet weather, and much labour in watering saved.  Twenty trusses of long straw are sufficient for 1800 feet of plants.

565.  Management of strawberry plants