A Reipt [I believe meant as receipt, widely used instead of recipe in the 19th century] to tempur [sic] edge tools. Take 5th of tallow, 1 1/2th of hard sope [sic], 1th of beeswax, 1th of horse hoof, 1th of salt / first fry the horses foot [crossed out] hoof in the tallow then take out the horse hoof then boil it all together and put it in a troft [sic] large enough to temper any tool then heat the tool a chery [sic] red and stick it in and leave it be in one plase [sic] til its quite cold / follow the above directions and you will never fail.
There you have it. I love this in so many ways, including for the 1th of this and the 1 and 1/2th of another, and for the multiple times they first wrote horse foot then hoof instead, and especially for the expression of total confidence in something that will never fail if one follows the directions properly. And for the endurance of this scrap of paper, folded up and with "receipt to temper edge tools" written neatly along one fold on reverse. Based on the handwriting, I am guessing 1830s or so, written in black ink on laid paper. I think very often of just becoming a paper dealer, and something like this is a prime examples of exactly why.
7 9/16" x 4 7/8". Irregular bottom edge but very good condition, ink strong, paper not fragile, a few stains I might guess are tallow spatters!
You might also like
