iv a public admission of its practical value, if we may be permitted to criticise our own performances, we have but little hesitation in saying that our LADY'S EVERY-DAY BOOK will be found equally useful, and a worthy companion to our former volume, and we confidently hope for it the same unbounded patronage. THE LADY'S EVERY-DAY BOOK OF ELEGANT ARTS AND DOMESTIC ECONOMY. Hints for Hot Weather.-The numerous fatalities and sickness that attend hot weather, renders it important to guard ourselves against it as much as possible. The sun that ripens the corn for our daily bread, and allures us abroad by its brilliant beams, is, nevertheless, fraught with our destruction if we expose ourselves too much to his powerful rays. From 6 to 11 a.m. are the established hours of work in India, and those who can would find it conduce to their comfort and health to adopt the same hours for their labours during the prevalence of almost Indian weather that July and August are so constantly attended by. Above all, the children should be carefully looked after in hot weather; they should, as a rule, be allowed to sleep throughout the day, and take their exercise only in the morning and evening. This caution may be more particularly recommended while on the accustomed sea-side visit. True, there may sometimes spring from over the sea a cool refreshing breeze to those sporting on the sands, yet we admonish all that they would be safer within doors while the sun's power is scorching up everything that comes in its fiery way. plentifully diluted, and ærated waters, are the only safe and suitable beverages for summer temperature; sulphuric acid, lemonade, lime-juice, and similar preparations, are at once refreshing, and excellent antidotes for diarrhoea, loss of appetite, and other disturbances of the system caused by hot weather. Never open windows while the sun shines on them, and the blinds should be wetted, or, better still, a wet blanket be hung behind them. In this way any room may be kept comparatively cool, especially those exposed to the rays of the sun. A flat vessel filled with water, on which are floated branches of trees covered with green leaves, is a very efficacious and pleasant means of imparting coolness to an apartment, and is much employed in Germany. The suspension of Indian matting, previously damped, at the open window, tends much to diminish the heat. This matting may be imitated by any kind of plaited grass. But the most important thing to ob serve and watch is the temperature of the body-we mean that we should be very careful not to increase the heat of the blood by animal food, either fresh Heat, too, stimulates thirst, and it is or seasoned, or by stimulating drinks. important to remember that all alcoho- Nothing could be more dangerous, and lic drinks and high feeding are great many deaths arise from the too prevaaids in hot weather in producing sick-lent practice of indulging in animal ness and even sunstroke. Light wines, food and alcoholic drinks, during the B hot seasons. It is opposed to the great physiological rule, which is to keep the body cool. Moderately acid drinks are both very grateful and wholesome, and are, moreover, cheap. We learnt from Franklin a century ago that the solar heat is absorbed with greater or less facility according to the colour of the object exposed to its rays. Every one remembers how he put pieces of cloth, similar in texture and size, but different in colour, upon fresh-fallen snow in the sunlight, and how he found the snow melted under the pieces of cloth quickest when the cloth was black, less quickly under the blue, green, purple, red, yellow, in the order enumerated, and very slowly indeed under the white. Each day's experience shows us that we do not need to be made of snow in order to melt rapidly under a black dress. What we require for comfort for summer wear is of course a light or white material, in order that the heat rays may be reflected as much and absorbed as little as possible. The material should be porousshould imprison, that is, large quantities of air in its texture, and serve, therefore, as a very bad conductor of heat, while at the same time facilitating evaporation of the moisture from the surface of the body. These qualities are possessed in the highest degree by white flannel, and there is no reason that we can find, remarks the Lancet, why this material should not be generally adopted. Propriety of Speech.-1. You must be quite as anxious to talk with propriety as you are to think, work, sing, paint, or write according to the most correct rules. 2. Always select words calculated to convey an exact impression of your meaning. 3. Let your articulation be easy, clear, correct in accent, and suited in tone and emphasis to your discourse. 4. Avoid a muttering, stuttering, guttural, or lisping pronunciation. 5. Let your speech be neither too loud nor too low, but adjusted to the ear of your companion. Endeavour to prevent the necessity of the person you are speaking to crying "what do you say?" 6. Avoid a loquacious propensity; you should never occupy more than your share of conversation, or more than is agreeable to others. 7. Beware of such vulgar interpolations as "You know," "You see," "I'll tell you what." 8. Learn when to use and when to omit the aspirate h. This is an indispensable mark of a lady's education. 9. Pay a strict regard to the rules of grammar even in private conversation. If you do not understand those rules learn them, whatever be your age or station. 10. Though you should always converse pleasantly, do not mix loud bursts of laughter with it. 12. Above all, let your conversation be intellectual, graceful, chaste, discreet, edifying and profitable. Furs and Moths.-Ladies are very properly anxious about keeping their furs free from moths during the summer months. A writer who may be relied on, says darkness is all that is needed. This little grey moth, or "miller," which deposits the eggs, moves only in the light. Enclose the article loosely in a paper box, put this in a pillow-case, or wrap it round with a cloth, and hang up in a dark closet. Camphor, spices, or perfumes, are of no use. Continual darkness is sufficient. 66 And do not take out the furs in June or July to give them an airing," for even then cometh the enemy, and it may be that in ten minutes after exposure to the light and sun has deposited a hundred eggs in the article. If you consider an airing indispensable, give the furs a good switching and put them quickly back. [We do not see why the old preventives for keeping furs from moths, such as camphor, &c., could not be persisted in combined with the dark ness recommended by the writer we have quoted from, and thus make twice sure of preserving our furs from the ravages of the moths.] Best Treatment of Cough.-For a simple cough, we consider the following treatment by Dr. Searle as the very best : remain unaltered.-4. The water when boiled must not become turbid. 5. About half a tablespoonful of the fluid being evaporated to dryness on the spirit lamp, there must be a slight residue left at the bottom of the spoon not turning black from organic matters.-5. The residue obtained by evaporating to dryness a sample of the water in a porcelain cup upon the teaurn, must not become black on the addition of a solution of sulphuretted hydrogen. "A simple cough, attended with little or no fever, is often relieved by the application of a mustard-plaster to the chest. The mustard should be fresh mixed with hot water as for the table, but a little more fluid, and spread upon Dry-Nursing.-Wherever it can be, a napkin about the size of a cheese- this evil practice should be avoided, plate, and then applied to the chest and as being dangerous to the health of windpipe, and kept on for ten or fifteen both mother and offspring. For no minutes, or as long as it can be con- other reason than that of inability on veniently borne. If necessary it may the part of the mother to suckle her be repeated every evening; immersing infant should the natural law be dethe feet and legs at the same time in parted from. But should a bad state hot water, and taking also a teaspoonful of health require it, and dry-nursing be of a mixture consisting of syrup of pop- decided on, it is essential to attend both pies, antimonial wine, and paregoric to the mode of administering the food, elixir, in the proportions of half an as well as its kind or quality. Alounce of the first, with a quarter of an though the fluid food of the infant does ounce of each of the others, every three not so much require the mixture of or four hours, according to the severity saliva to assist digestion, yet a degree of the cough; abstaining at the same of mastication, which increases the flow time from a stimulating or a too nour-of this fluid, will usually be beneficial. ishing diet. For this good reason, then, the boat "These means will soon remove the cough though it is often advisable to follow them up for a few nights with a pill of calomel and aloes, a grain of each, in relief of the secondary derangements of the liver and associated organs, which constantly succeed to cold; and from the neglect of which, though persons often get well of the prominent affections of the chest, they yet remain for a length of time after-ple, is the sucking-bottle. In its use, wards valetudinary. Tests of Pure Water.-The following practical rules for testing the wholesomeness of water (says Dr. Marcet) may be relied on:-1. The water must be perfectly colourless and transparent, leaving no deposit when allowed to stand undisturbed.-2. It must be quite devoid of smell.-3. | When litmus paper is immersed in the water, the colour of the paper must The most judicious mode, because the nearest approximation to the nip however, great cleanliness must be observed. The mouth of the bottle should be covered with wash-leather, or the nipple of a young heifer, in which a small piece of sponge is placed, in imitation of the pores of the nipple, to prevent too rapid a flow. The first is more easily kept clean; but the second is the most acceptable to the child, and, indeed, more eligible, as it brings the necessity of constant cleansing; it should be removed, and its sponge withdrawn, after each supply to the infant, and kept in rose or distilled water, with a few drops of spirits of wine, and re-applied when it is again used. ation of the bowels termed the Weaning Brash, which appears to be most frequent in summer and autumn; and in the male oftener than in the female infant. Of the species of artificial food, we This disorder does not always appear give preference to the Aylesbury Con- immediately on the commencement of densed Milk, a new preparation, but weaning. We have witnessed it five one that is fast supplanting all others weeks subsequently. It is marked by in the estimation of nurses and doctors. frequent evacuation from the bowels, When this is not attainable, let the and, occasionally, during the nausea, following preparation be used, which from the stomach of mucous or green nearly resembles the milk of the mo- fluid, attended with pain. On this enther-Fresh cow's milk, two-thirds, sue loss of appetite, wasting, fever, fretspring water, one-third; well sweet-fulness; and, towards the termination, ened with loaf sugar, which is the least tumefaction of the limbs, stupor, and liable to acidify and cloy. One tea- convulsions. We would advise, if age spoonful of sugar is the right quantity and all other circumstances are favourto sweeten one pint of water, or milk. able, that weaning should be adopted It is the large proportion of sugar, the in the more temperate months-as bland and nutrient property of which March, April, May, and October. renders the milk of the mare and the ass so nearly resembling that of the mother, for which they are eligible substitutes. After the first three months, milk with less water, or milk alone, should be given. The milk should not be sweetened until a few minutes before it is given to the baby, or it will turn sour. Neither should it be warmed over a fire; for when milk and water are used, the warm water will make the milk warm enough; when milk is used alone, it can be easily warmed by putting it into the feeding-bottle, and then putting the feeding-bottle, into warm water. The milk should never be given more than lukewarm. Weaning. After the ninth month, if the child has cut three or four of its front teeth, and appears in good health, the process of weaning should not be delayed, the first period of childhood being then past. It is a process, it must be owned, of much importance, as its results are often unfavourable to the child; it is a renouncement of its earliest habits, and is frequently marked by disordered functions and derangement of general health, the result of mere change of food. The most frequent malady is that protracted relax Measles. The earliest symptoms, commencing from ten to fourteen days after exposure, are redness and tumefaction, and water running from the eyes; languor, sneezing, head-ache, intolerance of light, dry cough, fever ; on the fourth or fifth day the skin is covered with small, slightly raised, red spots, coalescing and forming red patches of a circular form, with often a few purple spots; sometimes bleeding at the nose; on the seventh or eighth day the redness fades, the fever subsides, and the efflorescence terminates in scaly exfoliation of the skin. In the milder forms a gentle emetic, if there be an accumulation of mucus in the throat, a mild laxative occasionally, acidulated barley-water and other simple fluids, cooling mixture, and a well-regulated temperature of the room of about sixty degrees, are the only essential rules to be observed. Inflammatory symptoms, or severe relaxation of the bowels, require more scientific consideration. The danger in measles will be in proportion as the fever is severe, or the more important organs, as the lungs, &c., may become affected during or subsequent to the disease. On sudden recession of the eruption, |