WATER BOOTS

ARE absolutely necessary for those who shoot in wet places, or wait, in cold nights, for wildfowl; and if good, will effectually repel the water for a long time.

Mr. Short, of East Yarmouth, was by far the best maker of these boots, and was so clever in other parts of his business, that he was in the habit of sending boots and shoes to gentlemen above a hundred miles on the other side of London. Some of the fen sportsmen called him the "Emperor of the boot-makers." Since the last edition Mr. Short has retired: but his name, with the business, continues in able hands.

All boots, for going in the wet, answer much better if kept at least half a year before they are worn; and they should afterwards never be suffered to get too hard. Water boots should be invariably worn over an extra pair of coarse yarn stockings, without which you do not give them a fair trial.

So far from being hard to the feet, they are the softest possible wear, and may be made very light. They should always be made to draw, when required, very far above the knees, in order to protect them from cold or wet. Nothing, by the way, would answer so well in rain or snow for stage coachmen, if these gentlemen would just then condescend to wear them. (I see that many coachmen have taken this hint since the earlier editions.)

Various dressings are recommended, though, perhaps, almost any grease may answer; but the first and most effectual application might be tar, tallow, and bees' wax melted (not too warm), and then poured into the boots; which, after having this shaken into every part of them, should be hung up to let it run out. By this dressing, and the sacrifice of the first pair of stockings that follows it, we may walk in the river with more comfort than a "Swell-kiddy" would cross the street after a shower.

This recipe, however, though a double defence, I do not mean to say is absolutely necessary; for I have latterly found that neat's foot oil answers every purpose, provided the boots are thus well anointed about once a year, to prevent the neat's foot from making them too porous.

As another good recipe, I should prefer the following one:

Melt these over a slow fire, and then add a few drachms of essential oil of lavender (or thyme). With this your boots are to be rubbed with a brush, either in the sun, or at some distance from the fire.

The application must be repeated, as often as the boots become dry again, until they are fully saturated.

If your heel should become galled by walking in a water-, or any other, boot, you will immediately remedy the inconvenience by applying a piece of gold-beaters' skin, and over that a little court plaster, in order doubly to defend the part. But even in this trifle there is a right and a wrong way of going to work. Instead of cutting with scissors, and merely wetting the plaster, let it be for a moment heated by the fire, as well as wetted, being previously

stamped with a wadding-punch, by which means, from having no angles, or corners, it will stick as fast as your own skin; provided that, when on and dry, you put over it a little cold cream, or any kind of grease, in order to repel the damp.

The application that has been usually recommended to me by surgeons is diachylon-plaster, which, in cold weather, curls up, and torments you so much in walking, that you soon become lame again, and then wish the doctor at Jericho. Go to Godfrey's, or some other first-rate chemist, in order to get the sticking-plaster in perfection, as many a one has poisoned his skin by not having the genuine article.

Let me now supersede the recipe for cure, by giving what is better, - a preventive.

Then have

Get a square silk pad, similar to a kettle-holder. sewn, on two opposite corners of it, pieces of list long enough to go twice round, and tie on, the ancle. No wrinkle of a water-boot can then cut or bruise your "tendon Achillis," or back sinew, provided you secure the pad firmly, by putting it over your common stocking, and under your yarn stocking. I was stupid enough not to think of this plan till 1828. Thus, if we were to shoot for a century, we should always be finding out something useful; however frivolous it may appear, when mentioned to a reader who is not in immediate want of it.

WATER-PROOF DRESSING FOR SHOES,

ETC.

TAKE a piece of Indian rubber, about the size of a walnut: cut it in small pieces, and put it into a phial with four ounces of highly rectified spirits of turpentine. Cork it up for about a fortnight (more or less, according to cold or hot weather), and shake it every day. When this mixture has come to a consistence about the thickness of treacle, it is fit for use. You may then work it, with a paint brush, into leather, rope, or what you please. But, when used for the soles of shoes, leather trunks, or any thing that does not require flexibility, you should add, to this composition, three times the quantity of copal varnish. The most effectual mode of application is to anoint, not only the outside seams, but also the whole inside of the soles.

If you want this dressing in a hurry, and an extra expense is no object, you will find that ether, or naphtha, will dissolve Indian rubber, and dry, much quicker than spirits of turpentine. The powder colours, for painting, either with or without oil, will mix perfectly well with this composition.

The foregoing recipe was given me by Mr. Cornelius Varley, who tells me that he sent it, many years ago, to the Philosophical Magazine. Not wishing, however, to enter it without some kind of investigation, I applied to Mr. Fisher, the celebrated chemist in Conduit-street, who was good enough to make for me as many experiments as the limited time would

admit of. The preparation which he found to mix the best, was three oz. of Indian rubber, boiled for about three hours, in a pint of linseed oil*, which thus became immediately of a good consistence; but it required such a time to dry, that he afterwards found it necessary to add spirits of turpentine. In short, it has long been known that the solution of Indian rubber is a valuable recipe for making things waterproof: and, as I formerly observed, "there are so many ways of doing it; and, perhaps, among them all, the best not yet discovered, that we must, for the present, dismiss the subject by merely giving the hint, with the hope of putting our speculators on the scent, to bring to perfection what would be to their own advantage, and worthy the notice of the public." But now, and long since these hints were first written, Indian-rubber dresses, and covers of every kind, have been brought to perfection by the universally known article called a "Mackintosh."

NEW PLAN FOR SHOE-MAKING.

In February 1844, I thought of a new plan for making waterproof all boots and shoes, from the clodhopping thicks of a tramper in wet and dirt, up to the super-exquisites of a Polka dancer at Almack's: viz. Put between the sole-leathers, and an inch or more up the sides, and over the toes, two thicknesses of oilsilk. Let the glazed sides come together, so as to stick fast to each other. This makes the shoes per

* This comes very near to the recipe given in our former editions, and now very much in use for dressing Russia duck.