X | The Cellar, Fires, Plumbing, Etc.
IT IS more healthful to have a cellar—a clean cellar—under a house than not to have one.
And why?
Soil has air in it. Sometimes it is good air, sometimes bad air. The soil newly turned up in the fields gives off a fragrance of its own. The earth thrown out on the city pavement by a man looking for a leak in a drain gives off an odour which makes one hurry one's steps. The soil under a house gives off vapours and gases in the same way, good or bad according to location. Inasmuch as we cannot watch the air under the house as we can that in a room and would not always know its quality if we could, it has been found better to dig out a chamber under the house and line it with stones or cement, or even leave it just a hole in the earth into which air can be admitted. For this allows a circulation of upper air under the house which is safer to have there than air from the soil.
The more we can shut out the breath of the soil in towns and cities the better, for such soil is full of drains and gas pipes, and the dirt of streets and crowded houses, and sometimes has buried in it cess-pools and leaking sewers. Unpleasant to think of? Yes, but the thought does very well as a spur to make one keep the cellar clean and dry.
A cellar sealed with cement is the best kind, because the soil-air is shut out unless there comes a crack in the cement. Walls of stone laid in cement are good but not so good, and brick walls are not nearly so good. Stones are a little porous and bricks very porous. Sooner or later moisture comes through either. In the country one often sees cellars with hard earth floors and they are fairly sanitary as long as the soil surrounding the house is used only for cleanly purposes. But before plumbing is put into the house or a sewer into the neighbourhood the cellar should be cemented.
I have seen cellar windows which would not open. They ought to open easily and one at least should be opened for a while every day that it is not snowing or raining. They ought also, to be kept as clean as other windows are, for light is necessary to the healthfulness of the cellar. Have the window openings covered with wire netting, strong enough on the one hand and fine enough on the other to exclude cats and flies.
Every cellar without any exception whatever should be white. White!
They may be painted white or whitewashed white. There are also substances of the nature of calcimine which are somewhat crystalline, and are therefore especially good for whitening dark cellars.
Whitewash is often decried because it rubs off upon things which touch it and also because flakes of it fall upon the floor and into uncovered receptacles. If a little size or thin glue is put into whitewash its objectionableness in these ways is much lessened, and comes to weigh little against its excellent recommendations; it is purifying, it destroys the eggs of insects, it is inexpensive and it requires no special skill to apply it. There are a few words on this last point in the chapter on housecleaning.
Whatever is done to the cellar walls should be done over again once or twice a year. There is much dust, much dampness and much need for more cleanliness even in the cleanest cellars.
It is more convenient if the cellar is divided into rooms, that food and stores of various kinds may be kept separate from the furnace and the fuel. If this is not possible, the next best thing is to have the coalbin enclosed, for the coal makes the worst of the cellar dirt. There should be a window in the coalbin through which the coal can be put in.
One needs shelves in the cellar and receptacles for vegetables. The shelves are better fastened to supports attached to the ceiling than put against the walls. There are then no cracks and corners, for dust, and the shelves are removed from the possible dampness of the wall. Some people advocate the building of bins for vegetables. This is probably advisable if one must store many. For keeping only a few, neat boxes or baskets which may be moved about, are better. If one keeps food in the cellar, a cupboard or safe made of wire netting is a convenience. It should stand on legs which raise it two or three feet off the floor. If preserves and jellies are kept in the cellar, it is desirable to have a cupboard more completely enclosed than the safe, to protect them from dust, quick changes of temperature and dampness.
Shelves, cupboards, bins and partitions should be as white as the walls.
The housewife pays a visit to the cellar now and then with no errand except to look at it. The survey may give her housewifely satisfaction, and it may give her something to do or to have done. She should go with nose alert and eye keen.
Is there any odour noticeable beyond that slight unavoidable cellar smell? If there is, is it a spoiled sweet potato, or clam, or a working jar of canned fruit, or—what? Find it; never rest while there is an objectionable smell in the cellar.
Is there a damp spot on walls or floor? If there is the cause must be found and put an end to. If there is one near the place where the waste pipes leave the house which cannot be accounted for, send for a plumber.
Is there any article out of its place? Is there any pile of things which might be looked over and in part thrown away? Is there any rubbish? Is the wood piled evenly? Is the coalbin swept up? Are the vegetables in boxes or bins and not on the floor or in corners? Are there cobwebs? Does the floor need sweeping? Are the windows clean and some of them open?
If, in spite of everything one can do, the cellar smells a little musty, some unslacked lime put in a box on the floor will help it. In a cellar with an earth floor it is well sometimes to sprinkle lime in the corners and in out-of-the-way places where it will not be walked upon.
Things which must stand permanently in the cellar are the better for having racks to stand upon. Barrels, ashcans, kerosene cans and cases containing bottles sometimes ooze moisture, sometimes absorb moisture from the floor; their bottoms thus become sodden and mouldy.
Slats nailed on cross-pieces and laid on the floor for such things to stand upon, make the cellar and its contents more cleanly and more dry. They are a contrivance of great use and simply obtained. It is, of course, pleasant to have them made by a carpenter, but three discarded bedslats nailed on the flat sides of some short pieces of floor joist make a rack that will hold two barrels, and small racks can be made in a few minutes from the boards of a box cover nailed on the cleats that have held the box together.
When the cellar floor is swept be sure to use something, preferably not water, to lay the dust. This is especially necessary when the furnace is in use. Dampened sawdust is good for this purpose.
The Plumbing
Before settling down to live in a place, one should know where the water supply comes from, and where waste water goes. If the water supply in a city or town comes from a far away stream or an artesian well, and the health of the community is fairly good, one may rest content. If, however, the water is notably or probably polluted, one should boil or at least filter water for drinking and cooking and in every way possible safeguard the family health from this source of danger.
A sewerage system which does not carry the waste a long distance away from any dwelling is not a very good system. If one must depend upon such a system it is well to do and say everything possible to have it improved.
If you live in a country place and must depend on a surface well for water, you must guard it. Have it cleaned at regular intervals; have the cover or platform over the mouth such that no creatures can get in, nor water or dust fall through; allow no rubbish nor waste water to be thrown near it; keep it well pumped off and see that pigpens, barnyards, poultryyards and closets are as far off as possible. The custom of keeping butter or other food cool by hanging it down the well is picturesque, but I can think of no other recommendation of the practice. Keep everything out of the well from frogs to custard pies.
Certain very simple natural laws have been taken advantage of in getting water in and out of houses. It is an old axiom that water will not run up hill, and one would not expect it to run up a house, but another old axiom saves us from carrying rivers upstairs in pails—namely, water seeks its level.
If water is poured into a U-shaped tube, it will stand just as high in one side of the U as in the other, will it not? When a house is supplied with water from a spring on the side of a hill, we have a big irregular U-tube like this dotted line. As even the garret of this house is lower than the spring, the water will have force when it comes from the pipes, that is, it could yet go higher because it has not run as far up in the U on the house side, as it is on the spring side. Sometimes, as we approach a town, we see a water tower on a hill, or a tall iron stand-pipe. They are one side of a U in a water system. Water is pumped into the tower or the stand-pipe, then it runs into the houses of the town through many pipes which are the other side of the U. There is a library of books one may read about this U performance—its relation to other laws, its limitations and the thousand uses to which it has been put. But all there is to the simple, extraordinary fact, can be seen in a bent glass tube which you can hold in your hand.
The side of the U which comes into a town is no longer one pipe but many water mains in streets and multitudes of little pipes in each house. These last are part of the house plumbing. A plan of the house with the position of all the pipes indicated should be one of the housekeeper's possessions. She may not be able to do much about disordered plumbing—in fact, she had better not try to do much; it is not a safe direction for amateur effort—but such a plan is of use to workmen who come to do jobs in the house, and it may keep some zealous husband or brother from driving a nail into a gas pipe in an effort to hang a picture.
Water is frequently got out of the house by giving it a good start and then letting it run down according to its nature. Waste pipes are as far as possible perpendicular, and the start is given the water by the weight of a basin or a tubful, or by the sudden emptying of the tank of the closet.
That principle of the U, however, is used also in the disposal of waste water. It is the principle on which many traps are constructed. Traps are contrivances for closing the connection between a house and the public sewer. If you have an imagination, or if you will read Victor Hugo's description of the Paris sewers in "Les Misérables" as a help to imagination, it will not be necessary to explain why this connection should be closed.
To make a trap with what is known as a water-seal, the U pipe is turned into an S fallen forward, fallen S. Under the basin in the bathroom one can see the waste pipe and can imagine where the water is inside. It flows out of the basin into the first loop of the S, rises into and flows over the other loop until the basin and pipe are emptied as far as a. The water has then no power to force itself beyond the loop b, and stays in the first loop, forming a water seal between the sewer and the outlet of the basin. Through that loop water gases and odours cannot come, and across the loop at b, impure substances and water cannot force their way back from a lower level.
It is well to rinse a basin, sink or tub after it is used, and one must be particular that the closet flushes generously, for the water left in the loop should be clean water. If one merely allows the water from tub or basin to sink through the outlet some of that water remains in the loop, and it is water which contains impurities washed from clothes or bodies. You see the practice of rinsing bathtubs and basins has more in it even than courtesy.
Occasionally, clean, hot, strong suds should be emptied down basins, tubs, sinks and closets and allowed to stand in the loop, as this cleanses the pipe from impurities or grease which may have adhered to its sides. Disinfectant may be used in the same way when it is thought to be needed. Strong disinfectant should not be left long in a trap as it may eat the joints or even the substance of the pipes. On the other hand, in judging the quantity to use, allowance must be made for the fact that disinfectant poured down pipes goes into water, into a good deal of water in the case of the closet.
Two things sometimes make traps ineffectual. One is that the loop may not be deep enough. An S like this, for instance, is useless. So much water can flow out that an air passage is left at a, and the pipe is not sealed. The other thing is that sometimes the suction of water rushing down from an upper story will draw the water out of the traps it passes on the way. Either of these difficulties can only be remedied by an alteration in the plumbing arrangements. The concern of the housekeeper in the matter is not to rest if the waste pipes give off the least odour, and to get as reliable a person as possible to inspect them. To have good plumbing is worth going without much. In truth, it is the last thing in which to exercise economy. In building a new house, it is better to have no rugs, no table-linen, and to leave two rooms unfurnished or unbuilt than to put in cheap plumbing.
Besides the traps under basins, sinks, etc., there is usually a trap wherever a drain-pipe runs out of the house to the street sewer. This doubles the protection. These traps are sometimes outside the foundation wall, sometimes in the wall and occasionally inside the cellar. One should know where they are in case anything is the matter with them, and also in order that one may not put up a shelf for milk, or a bin for potatoes directly over the spot where a trap is.
Drainage systems always have to be ventilated. A pipe which extends out of the roof of the house, or runs up the side beyond the eaves, or comes up from the foundation or the lawn with a hood over it, is a ventilator for the drainage. They help to make the air pressure right in the pipes and they prevent the gathering of foul explosive gases. As they are vents for such things, one does not want them close to a roof window, nor under a veranda, nor anywhere except in the open upper air.
Ashes and Garbage.—To say that only liquid substances should be poured down waste-pipes seems a needless repetition of what everybody knows, yet it is knowledge constantly disregarded and sometimes forgotten even by careful people. Waste substances not suitable for the pipes have to be somewhat classified. Cities and towns have different regulations for the disposal of waste and sometimes one is required to do a good deal of sorting in compliance. There are, however, three general classes of waste; ashes, garbage and trash.
Nothing should be put into ashcans except ashes. Garbage is the waste from food, or any substances which are wet or subject to decomposition. Trash is papers, cans, bottles, egg shells, glass, hair, dust, broken objects of all sorts and kindred things. This class may have to be subdivided several times for the convenience of people who remove it, but the three main divisions in house waste are made not on account of requirement but for the sake of neatness and decency.
For all these things it is preferable to have covered cans; for garbage it is necessary. In a house, ashcans will usually be kept in the cellar convenient to the furnace. Trash receptacles can be kept there also. They should be covered, and large enough to hold the trash without spilling. Garbage cans should be kept outside the house if possible. Often a little place can be built for them close to the back door, enclosed in an area or on a back porch. Such an enclosure needs some means of ventilation and should be periodically scrubbed, then disinfected with chloride of lime or some such thing. In flats or apartments, where the garbage can must be kept in the kitchen, it is a good plan to wrap the garbage in many thicknesses of newspaper and put these bundles into the can. When this method is employed the can is less unpleasant and less difficult to clean. This cleaning is disagreeable work but it must be done or the can will become exceedingly offensive. One is fortunate if such work may be done out of doors. First rinse the can with cold water and, if necessary, assist the process with a wad of newspaper tied on a stick. Pour the rinse-water on the ground or through a sink strainer. Then pour into the can a liberal allowance of hot water and put some strong washing powder into it. Rub the sides and bottom of the can with an old brush or broom kept for the purpose. Pour out the water, rinse the can with clean water and ammonia and begin its usefulness again by putting into it the contents of the sink-strainer or the scraps that you gather off the ground where the first rinse-water was poured.
The disposal of various forms of house waste in country places usually requires more care and attention than the same matter in cities and town. One gets little outside help, and the customary methods are often untidy and unsanitary.
Water may be poured on grass or flower beds or on the ground, if one is careful not to put it in the same place with any frequency. Soapy water thrown on garden paths will help to keep the weeds from growing. Water from an ice-cream freezer is good for the same purpose. Wash water, or water carried down from bedrooms should never be thrown on a vegetable garden. One cannot be sure that the earth, and the air, and the rain will take up the impurities soon enough to keep the vegetables from being contaminated.
Some garbage can be buried; some can be burned. A weekly bonfire is an excellent thing in places where there is no regular means for disposing of waste. Into it can go most of the trash and some of the garbage in the shape of vegetable husks and parings, and other things not very moist.
A little care on the part of the housewife will make an outdoor closet an entirely sanitary convenience. It should be made as cleanly as possible inside and out by means of paint or calcimine, and frequent scrubbing of all its wooden fittings. One of these fittings should be a good-sized box with a scoop or fire shovel to go with it. This box should be kept filled with earth—not ashes—of which a liberal quantity should be put down the closet whenever it has been used. An earth closet, as it is called, if carefully looked after, is never offensive. No waste water should ever be emptied down such a closet, and depth should not be obtained by digging out the ground under the building, because rain water will gather in the depression thus made. The interior of the closet should be shallow and earth-covered. These two characteristics make frequent removals of the contents necessary; this is troublesome but sanitary.
Fires
To make and manage fires one must understand them. They are simple and easy to understand, but they are also capable of giving a person who is unacquainted with their ways great trouble and anxiety.
A Wood Fire.—A wood fire on the hearth is the simplest one in a house. Can you make it? One must have in the first place, a hearth, a flue and a draught. The hearth is merely a place in the floor laid with stone or brick to put the fire on. A flue is a chimney or a part of a chimney over the hearth to carry off the smoke and to increase the draught. The desperate aborigine who sprang up weeping and choking with smoke and chopped a hole in his new bark roof, discovered that it not only let out the smoke but made the fire burn better. It made a draught. The draught is the air that draws up the chimney. It is caused chiefly by the fact that warm air rises. The air in a room draws up the chimney if it is warmer than outside air, and when a fire is lighted and the air at the bottom of the chimney becomes very hot, it draws up hard and quickly. Sometimes when a fire smokes people say, "The chimney is cold," that is, the chimney is so cold that the hot air ascending becomes chilled and heavy before it reaches the top of the chimney, and does not draw out hard and quickly enough to make a strong draught. So the smoke stays down instead of going up, and the fire does not burn well. The remedy is to burn as much paper and light, dry wood on the hearth as you can until the chimney is warmed a little.
If there are a hearth, a flue and a draught, the next thing to observe is whether there are ashes on the hearth from a former fire. If there are a few, brush them together into a neat, flat pile under the flue and against the back of the chimney. If there are many, remove some, but never all unless you do not expect to have a fire again for a long time. Ashes hold heat. They are soon warmed by the new fire, and help to keep the coals hot. Just as a "cozy" keeps heat in a tea pot and a fur coat keeps heat in you.
Place the andirons straight and close enough together to support the average length of the wood. If one can get a big heavy piece of wood, that should first be put in at the back of the hearth.
On the bed of ashes between the andirons or on the bare hearth put paper crushed into soft balls.
If the kindling is little sticks, lay the fire by the pig-sty method. That is, on the soft paper balls lay two little sticks parallel with the andirons, then two more little sticks with their ends crossing the ends of the first pair, tic-tac-toe symbol keep on doing this, laying the sticks first in one direction then in the other until the sty is two or three rails high. Then lay two larger sticks in an X on the top and the fire is ready for lighting.
If the kindling is blocks and shavings scatter them loosely over the paper balls, keeping it all in a small space but not packing or crushing it together in the very least.
When we light a fire or blow a fire, we do so from the bottom because it is the draught sweeping up through the fuel which makes it ignite and burn. The fuel should therefore be laid loosely with many cracks and holes for air. The advantage of making paper into balls is that one cannot pack balls closely.
Light the fire from a light or from another fire or with a match. This is the shortest and simplest act in fire making, but the most extraordinary. It would take some one wiser than three philosophers, four scientists and twelve owls to tell you what the flame is which springs up on the hearth. A springing flame has remained through all time such a mystery and wonder, that the poet, the musician and the devotee have woven it into rhythm, and music, and worship—and what is more, a boy and a fox terrier will keep still before it for half an hour.
When the fire is lighted, first the paper burns easily and quickly, then the small pieces of kindling light more slowly and burn more slowly, and from them the small pieces of wood light yet more slowly and burn yet longer, and when they are really burning one may put on the ordinary sticks, leaving always cracks between for the air and flames to draw through. Three sticks are needed to keep a good fire; a heavy one at the back, in front of it a stick almost burned through and a fresh one.
The person who lays the fire, unless she is expert, should light it. There is no way of learning how to lay it, nor of finding out the peculiarities of the fireplace and the fuel, except by seeing how the fire acts when it is lighted.
A Coal Fire.—The coal fire in the kitchen in no way differs in principle from the wood fire on the hearth. The arrangements for it, though, are different. A range or a stove holds the fire instead of the hearthstone. The smoke and draught, instead of going directly up the flue, are led to it by a stove pipe. The draught must get into the stove in order to go up through the fire into the chimney.
The reason that a fire in a stove is more difficult to understand is that we have several contrivances for regulating and utilizing the heat. Most of these are called draughts or dampers. One knows from the words what they are for; the draughts let in draught at the bottom of the fire, the dampers in some way damp the ardour of the fire.
Stoves or ranges even of the same make are rarely exactly alike, but one can learn to manage the draughts and dampers in a few minutes' examination by keeping in mind the fixed principle that a stream of air enters under the fire, flows through the fire and passes out through the chimney. That to make the fire hot, we do our utmost to remove obstructions from the stream; that to deaden the fire, we obstruct the stream as much as we can. If we want the range hotter, we open a door or slide open some slits which will let in air underneath the fire, and we open the damper in the stove pipe, that is we make as much passage-way for draught through the pipe as we can. If we want the range less hot, we let in air on top of the fire, and shut the pipe damper, that is, the space for the draught to go up the pipe is made smaller and air coming in on top of the fire meets and checks air coming from underneath.
The terms used in regard to regulating fires are confusing. When people say open the draughts, they mean let the stream of air flow unobstructed, but it is often accomplished by shutting something, such as the slits at the top of the fire, and any opening in the stove pipe. The reverse is also true. Shutting the draughts means obstructing the stream of air, and often requires opening places which let in air going in a contrary direction to the regular draught, such as, openings in the pipe and at the top of the fire. This is the reason that it is better to get the principle of the draught thoroughly in mind and then work the dampers and draughts in accord with it, rather than to follow blindly directions which may utterly mislead.
Pipe dampers are sometimes inside the pipe with only a little handle outside. Such a damper is a circle of iron with a small hole in the middle. When the handle is vertical, the circle is vertical and the pipe is open. When the handle is horizontal, the circle is horizontal, and the pipe closed except for the small hole in the circle.
Besides dampers which regulate the amount of heat, there are oven dampers which regulate its direction. An oven damper is a contrivance by which heat is directed over or under or around the oven. When the oven is to be used, the heat is directed there; when it is not, the heat is allowed to concentrate elsewhere. These oven contrivances are not usually visible, and are worked by a handle on the outside of the stove. Sometimes directions for moving the handle are on it; if not, one must experiment to find out what happens.
No one can cook with any certainty until she thoroughly understands the stove or range used. This is best done by "making it work"; opening everything which will open, turning everything which will turn, finding out what everything is for, taking things apart and putting them together again with "'satiable curiosity." If one does this before the fire is lighted, and then lights the fire, there will be few mysteries left unsolved.
Though the principles to be remembered in lighting a coal fire in a stove are the same as those which govern the lighting of the wood fire on the hearth, there are some variations in the process and some additional acts to perform.
If there are ashes in the stove they must be dumped and removed. They cannot warm the coals as in the hearth fire, and if left under the grate they obstruct the draught. The fire maker is fortunate if the grate of the stove is so constructed that the ashes may be dumped. If this is not the case the grate must be shaken until it is empty. That as little dust as possible may come out into the room, close all the openings in the stove before beginning to shake the grate and do not open them again until a few minutes after the shaking is over.
Lay in the grate of the stove a wood fire like the one on the hearth: balls of paper, loose kindling, larger sticks crossed, and all with many cracks between. But in addition sprinkle over the top a fire-shovelful of coal. Be generous with kindling and wood: it takes strong heat to ignite coal.
Just before lighting the fire see that the stream of air is unobstructed; all the openings at the bottom of the fire open, all the openings at the top shut, the pipe unobstructed, and the heat directed away from the oven.
Light the fire from below; this is often most easily accomplished by crushing up a sheet of newspaper, putting it under the grate and lighting it. When the sticks are really burning, put on another shovelful of coal and as soon as this begins to ignite, put on two more. Much coal put on at a time smothers the fire.
In spite of frequent and terrible accidents people persist in lighting fires with kerosene. It is more sensible never to do it, but if you sometimes do, at least do it in a sensible way, that is, soak wood or paper in the oil and put it into the grate, then lay the fire as usual. Never, never bring the oil can near the range at any time or for any purpose. Almost invariably the use of oil to light the fire is an indication of laziness or ignorance.
It is more economical of time and fuel to keep the kitchen fire over than to let it out every night. In a good stove, fire which is properly raked and cared for can be kept week after week, month after month, just as it can be kept in a furnace.
The daily care required by a coal fire is outlined below:
At night, the fire should be thoroughly raked and coal enough put on to last until after breakfast. Leave the draughts open a few minutes until the gas has burned off, then shut them for the night.
The first thing in the morning, open all the draughts and get the fire well up. It ought not be necessary to put on coal.
After breakfast, rake the fire thoroughly, put on coal and empty the ashes.
After luncheon put on as much coal as will be necessary to produce a good fire at dinner time.
When a hot fire is needed for many hours feed it with a few coals at a time; this will not deaden the fire and yet will keep it from burning out. A fire which shows red underneath and has a few black coals on top is in a healthy condition. As soon as all the coals are red the heat begins to wane.
The Furnace Fire.—The ability to run the kitchen fire will enable the housewife to tend the furnace occasionally. If, however, she wishes to care for it regularly, she will need to seek instruction from some competent person who can show her the use of the particular draughts, gauges, thermometers and other indicators by which the fire and the steam or water are regulated.
A skilled person's aim in managing a furnace is perfect regularity. Necessary care should be given it every day at the same hours, and the fire should be kept as far as possible in the same condition. It is injurious to the fire and to the furnace to attend to it too often or not often enough; and the house will never be evenly heated if the fire is first allowed to get very low and is then urged to an unusual height.
Stoves, furnaces and chimneys need occasional cleaning. Furnaces should be cleaned when the fire is let out in the spring, and carefully looked over in the fall by a competent man. Ranges which are not used in the summer should be treated in the same way. Other ranges should be cleaned and looked over once a year.
At some time when the kitchen fire is out the inside of the stove should be swept, and the dust removed through an opening for the purpose in the back or side of the stove.
About once a year all the flues in the house ought to be cleaned. This is for two reasons, one, because the soot with which they become coated is a non-conductor of heat and keeps the chimneys from warming quickly; the other, because soot is inflamable. When we say a chimney is on fire, we mean that the soot on the inside is burning. It makes a terrifying roar, but don't stop to listen to it. Shut all the openings in the stove. Throw salt on the fire. If there is a fireplace instead of a stove at the bottom of the chimney close the opening in some way. This may sometimes be done with a rug or a thick newspaper held tightly stretched over the opening of the chimney. It must cover the whole opening and must not be allowed to draw in on the fire. The point is to keep the air from rushing up the chimney to feed the fire. This is done by shutting out the air and by sending up gas from the burning salt which is inimical to fire.
Gas Range.—A gas range is a much simpler matter from a mechanical point of view than one in which coal is burned. There is little to do except keep it clean. It is lighted as any gas burner is lighted, though preferably with a taper instead of a match, for in that case your hand is not near enough to be burned by the first leap of the flame. Fix firmly in mind which one of the little cocks supplies each burner, and also that the cocks turn to the left to supply the gas, to the right to turn it off. If when a burner is lighted, it "burns back" with a roaring noise, turn the gas off and wait a moment or two before lighting it again. It will then light in the usual way.
The iron sheet under the top burners needs washing about once in two days, oftener if anything is spilled or boils over into it. More occasionally the burners should be washed and the holes all made clear with a wire or a broom straw. It does not hurt any part of a gas range to wash it; it does it good. Some people prefer not to black their ranges. The loss in appearance is made up for in the comfort of not having the range rub off black on hands or cloths.
The rack and drip pans for broiling must be washed every time they are used; otherwise, the grease left on them will smell and smoke and sometimes catch fire if the oven burners are lighted. It is well to rub the grease off the grate and the drip pan with a paper while they are still hot, it makes them easier to wash.
Sometimes the fat in this drip-pan catches fire while the broiling is yet going on. Usually people draw out the pan and blow out the blaze, but this is dangerous. Milk poured directly on the flame with a big spoon will quench it.
Light and Water
Watch the bills which come in for light and water. If they vary considerably and for no discoverable cause, or if they seem unreasonably large, have some one come and see if there are leaks, if the metres register correctly, and if they have been correctly read and the bills made in accordance with the readings.
Light bills naturally increase from June to December and decrease from December to June. They will be larger in a stormy month than in a bright one, and in an apartment with dark rooms than in one without. Water bills will be larger if the washing is done in the house than if it is not. Both light and water bills will be somewhat larger if the number of people in the household is increased. These things and any other household changes must be considered in accounting for variations in light and water bills.
The cost of both these commodities can usually be kept within bounds by avoiding waste, such as burning a reading light by which no one is reading, or five lights in the ceiling, two of which would not be missed, or neglecting to turn off range burners until five or ten minutes after the cooking is finished, or leaving faucets half turned on, or running the tub and basin over every time they are used. Sometimes a reasonable carefulness in such things saves the necessity of stricter economy.
The man who comes to read your gas, water or electric metres will usually be willing to teach you how to read them, if you ask as if you wanted information and not as if you wanted to catch him in a mistake. I might say here that plumbers, carpenters and furnace men if approached in the same way often prove very instructive. They are human, and can rarely resist the treat of giving information when the chance is offered to them. One can learn a great quantity of useful mechanics from them, besides things about their wives and children, both amusing and edifying.
These are pictures of a gas-metre at the beginning and end of a month.
The hands on the dials move in the directions the arrows indicate. Read the number last passed by the hand on each dial, beginning with the one farthest to the left and add two ciphers. x reads 57600; y reads 63800. The difference is the amount of gas used in the month.
If you cannot take the two ciphers on faith, there is another way of reading the metre. Observe the words over each dial. Dial c is in the hundreds moving toward "1 thousand," it therefore reads 600. Dial b is in the thousands moving toward "10 thousand," and therefore reads 7000. Dial a is in the ten thousands moving toward "100 thousand," and therefore reads 50,000. Together they amount to 57,600, the number obtained by the other method.
This is the picture of an electric metre:
To read the metre:
Each hand moves in the direction indicated by the arrows.
Read the figure that the hand has actually passed, beginning with the dial to the left.
755 K. W.'s
Subtract last month's reading from this reading and the difference will be the amount consumed.
| Viz: | 755 | |
| 726 | ||
| 29 | K. W.'s. |
The dials here are a simpler arrangement, as they merely represent the usual numeration—units, tens, hundreds, thousands.
This metre is in an especially instructive condition, because the 1,000's dial gives no reading. The hand has not yet reached 1.
The Refrigerator
A refrigerator serves its purpose better if it is placed in a pantry or on an enclosed porch. If it must be put in the kitchen, it should have the place farthest from the fire.
The drain pipe of the refrigerator, which carries off the water from the melting ice, sometimes empties into a pan, sometimes connects with other pipes which carry the water out of the house. It should never connect with the other drainage of the house, nor lead to any well or sewer which receives other drainage. No traps or plumbing contrivances are perfect enough to protect food which is shut up closely with the opening of a pipe connecting even remotely with the drainage system. Properly the drain pipe of the refrigerator should empty into an open basin or sink in the cellar, which in turn drains off into the ground.
The next point of importance after the disposal of its drainage, is to keep the refrigerator clean. Guard against spilling things on its shelves, wash the ice before it is put in, if it is not clean, and do not keep in it things with a strong or penetrating smell—An innocent dish of cold-slaw unthinkingly put into the refrigerator produces an odour which will startle the person who next opens the door.
A refrigerator needs cleaning once or twice a week. It should not be cleaned oftener than is necessary because cleaning wastes the cold. For this same reason wash it with cold water unless something greasy has been spilled in it, and never leave the doors open one second longer than is necessary.
Collect beforehand everything required for the cleaning, that, when the work is once begun, it may be finished quickly. One needs cold water in which there is baking soda, borax or boracic acid (2 oz. to the qt.), a brush for scrubbing, cloths for wiping, something long and slim with which to clean the drain pipe and a tray or pan to hold the ice while the ice compartment is being cleaned.
Take the food out of the refrigerator, then the ice. Quickly but thoroughly scrub and wipe dry the compartment for the ice, not forgetting the drain pipe. In many refrigerators the drain pipe can be removed for cleaning. Replace the ice and shut it in. Then scrub and wipe the other compartments or shelves, and include the pan and the floor under the refrigerator in this cleaning.
It is hardly necessary to say that rubbish and unsightly objects ought not to be tucked away behind or under the refrigerator. Its surroundings should be as clean and well-aired as possible.
A refrigerator is at its best when it is full of ice. To keep it full is usually found economical as well as sanitary. If the ice is gone and it will be some hours before a new supply will be brought, keep the doors of the refrigerator open until it can be refilled. Without ice the refrigerator becomes the very worst sort of crowded, unaired food closet.
If one has difficulty in keeping an old or poor refrigerator sweet, one or two pieces of charcoal wrapped in gauze and laid in the corners will help. They will need renewing frequently. No disinfectant, however odourless and harmless, should be put into the refrigerator or into the water with which it is washed. Soda, borax or boracic acid answer the same purpose and hurt nothing.
This chapter has concerned itself with what might be called the household genii. They have always, as old tales will tell you, been powerful and troublesome servants, yet withal valuable and fascinating. And, nowadays, we have many inventions for keeping them in order which would have made life easier for old-time sorcerers and magicians who sought to govern them by rubbing lamps and saying rhymes.