Household science and arts

with no projecting point. Clean the chimney by washing it in hot ammonia water. Dry it thoroughly on a clean glass towel kept for the purpose. Wipe the lamp on the outside with lamp cloth kept for this purpose only. III. Extinguishing. Oil lamps without extinguishers should be turned low enough to get the wick away from the air. Then they will go out of themselves. IV. QuaHty. Cheap burners of thin brass are not really economical, as they get out of order soon, and so are much harder to keep clean than well-made burners. The Kitchen Fire Requisites for a Fire. Air. Fuel. Matches or some other means of raising fuel to the kindling point. Fuel may be : — Paper. Peat. Shavings. Coke. Digitized by Google Wood. Gas. Charcoal. Denatured Alcohol. Coal. Gasoline. When hot enough to take fire, a substance is at the kindling point. THE COAL RANGE The range is an iron box with attached parts. The pupil should become thoroughly familiar with the range and all its parts. The fire box, the stovepipe, the dampers, the oven, and the ash pan. Fire Box. — The fire box varies much in size, but is usually rectangular in shape and holds the fuel. Stovepipe. — The stovepipe is used to carry off smoke and unburned gas. Dampers. — The dampers are used to control the currents of air. The front damper admits air below the fuel and allows it to bum, and is often called the fresh air damper. Closing it wholly or partly decreases the rate of burning. The slide or check draft admits air above the fuel and is opened to decrease burning. The oven damper is used for turning the hot air from the chimney to the oven. It should never be closed when the fire is new and the fuel smoking, but may be closed after the smoke has disappeared. The oven is one of the main parts of the range, and has iron walls and a tight-fitting door. Notice the ash pan. It should never be allowed to be so full that the ashes and cinders pile up against the fire grate. This not only chokes the fire, but bums out the grate. The ash pan should be taken out and emptied when there is little or no fire in the stove. Method of Building a Fire. — Brush all ashes from top of th« oven into the fire box. Turn the grate so as to dump all Digitized by Google THE GAS RANGE 21 ashes into the ash pan. Clean out all ashes and large and small cinders from the fire box. Tear paper into rather small pieces, crumple them loosely, using enough to cover the bottom of the grate. Put in small pieces of soft wood, arranging them loosely in crosswise manner. Place hard wood in same way, leaving spaces for air to pass through freely, and use enough wood to kindle the coal. Put on the covers, and open the fresh air damper and the oven damper. If the range needs blacking, do it now. Select a good quality of stove polish and moisten it with a little cold water. Apply it to the range with a dauber. Light the fire at the bottom, applying a lighted match to the paper, and while the fire is kindling, polish the range with a dry brush, beginning at the parts which are directly over the burning fuel. When the wood is kindling freely, add coal and never put coals above the top of the lining. It is both a hindrance and waste to put on too much coal when fire is kindling. Close the oven damper when the blue flame has disappeared from the coal and close the fresh air damper and the oven damper when the fire is thoroughly kindled. If a hot fire is needed for baking, leave the fresh air damper open. DIRECTIONS FOR KEEPING A FIRE OVERNIGHT Rake the fire, put on fresh coal, close fresh air, oven, and chimney dampers, and partly open the slide over the fire. THE GAS RANGE The gas range saves time and labor, does not heat the kitchen uncomfortably in summer, and, if managed with care, may be an economical means of cooking. Study all the parts of the gas range.