French Polish

Ingredients

• Shellac, one ounce and a half
• mastic, half an ounce
• sandarac, half an ounce
• rectified spirits of wine, two ounces

Method

1. 1

   Pound the gums finely, mix in a bottle, and heat in a kettle of cold water until it reaches a treacle-like consistency, stirring continuously.

As published

This recipe was extracted from The housekeeper's companion (1883), page 147. The excerpt below is the record exactly as published.

French polished should be carefully dusted every day, and polished once a week, with the furniture polish to be bought at any good chemist's. Generally these polishes are better and really cheaper than any that the house- keeper can make herself. The chemical and mechanical ac- tion of different substances on articles of furniture is very little understood by persons in general, and consequently the most absurd directions are frequently issued for the preparation of cleaning materials, and also for preventing injury from certain agents. The substances from which furniture is chiefly ex- posed to injury are water, oils, spirits of various kinds, such as brandy, eau-de-Cologne, benzine, etc., and acids. Varnishes, or polished surfaces of wood, are easily injured by volatile mineral spirits, such as those used for lamps, or by any alcoholic spirit, as brandy or wine. The polish is com- posed of gums and resins which are soluble in spirits. Many of these polishes or varnishes are made by dissolving the ma- terials in alcohol, then when they are applied the spirit evapo- rates and the gum or resin is left in a thin polish or varnish on the wood. Of course, if wine, brandy, or spirits of wine fall on it, a portion of it is again dissolved, and the brilliancy of the surface is destroyed. The only remedy for these kinds of stains or marks is to have the table, or whatever it may be, re- polished. Heat has ths same effect on French polish. A hot plate, or dish, or cup, or mug, placed on it, leaves its shape as a dull mi'rk on the table. Therefore dining tables are better not French polished, but well rubbed with oil. When furniture is not French polished, it is well to rub it with linseed oil, slightly colored with alkanet root. Every time the dinner table is rubbed all the leaves should be put in, so that the portions of the table may be of the same color, for oil darkens mahogany, and if the leaves are not rubbed every time there will soon be a great difference of shade between them and the table. A Capital Recipe for Polishing Tables. — Cold-drawn lin- seed oil, one pint; spirits of wine, one ounce; white tonic vine- gar, one pint; spirits of turpentine, one ounce; powdered gum arable, one-half once; butter of antimony, one and one-half ounce; spirits of salt, one ounce. The abo\'" ingredients to be well mixed together and shaken previous to being used. Family Reoipe for PdUsli for Furniture not French Pol- ttOUSEHOLi). 31S ished. — Three ounces of beeswax; three ounces of hard white soap; one ounce of spermeceti, cut up small and simmered in a pint of water, keeping it stirred all the time. Pour it into a jar and keep it well covered. French Polish. — We give the following excellent recipe, which proves experimentally to be good for those who may- wish to polish a table or box for themselves, premising that the surface to which it is applied must be perfectly cleaned first: Shellac, one ounce and a half; mastic, half an ounce; san- darac, half an ounce; rectified spirits of wine, two ounces

Cook this with the app: pantry check, scaling, and the assistant.