It is stated by Mr. Knight, in his "Life of Caxton:"
"We have abundant evidence, whatever be the scarcity of books as compared with the growth of scholarship, that the ecclesiastics laboured most diligently to multiply books for their own establishments. In every great abbey there was a room called the Scriptorium, where boys and novices were constantly employed in multiplying the service- books of the choir, and the less valuable books for the library; whilst the monks themselves laboured in their cells upon bibles and missals. Equal pains were taken in providing books for those who received a liberal education in collegiate establishments."
Warton says:
"At the foundation of Winchester College, one or more transcribers were hired and employed by the founder to make books for the library. They transcribed and took their food within the college, as appears by computation of expenses on their account now remaining. But there are many indications that even kings and nobles had not the advantage of scholars by profession, and, possessing few books of their own, had sometimes to borrow of their more favoured subjects."
We learn from another source that the great not only procured books by purchase, but employed transcribers to make them for their libraries. The manuscript expense account of Sir John Howard, afterwards Duke of Norfolk, shows in 1467, Thomas Lympnor, that is Thomas the Limner of Bury, was paid the sum of fifty shillings and two pence for a book which he had transcribed and ornamented, including the vellum and binding. The limner's bill is made up of a number of items, "for whole vignettes, and half-vignettes, and capital letters, and flourishing and plain writing."
These transcribers and limners worked principally upon parchment and vellum, for the use of paper was by no means extensive until the invention of the art of printing. Some of the old manuscripts contain drawings representing a copier or transcriber at work, where the monk is represented as provided with a singular and tolerably complete set of apparatus to aid him in his work. The desk for containing the sheet or skin on which he is writing, the clasp to keep this sheet flat, the inkstand, the pen, and the knife, the manuscript from which the copy is being made, the desk for containing that manuscript, and the weight for keeping it in its place,—all are shown, with a clearness which, despite of bad perspective, renders them quite intelligible.
Of the two substances, parchment and vellum, before the invention of paper, another word or two may be said. Parchment is made from the skin of sheep or lambs; vellum, from that of very young calves (sometimes unborn ones), but the process of preparing is pretty much the same in both cases. When the hair or wool has been removed, the skin is steeped in lime water, and then stretched on a square frame in a light manner. While so stretched, it is scraped on the flesh side with a blunt iron, wetted with a moist rag, covered with pounded chalk, and rubbed well with pumice stone. After a time, these operations are repeated, but without the use of chalk; the skin is then turned, and scraped on the hair side once only; the flesh side is then scraped once more, and again rubbed over with chalk, which is brushed off with a piece of lambskin retaining the wool. All this is done by the skinner, who allows the skin to dry on a frame, and then cuts it out and sends it to the parchment maker, who repeats the operation with a sharper tool, using a sack stuffed with flocks (wool or hair) to lay the skin upon, instead of stretching it on a frame.
Respecting the quality, value, and preparation of parchment in past ages, it is stated in the "Penny Cyclopaedia" that parchment from the seventh to the tenth century was "white and good, and at the earliest of these periods it appears to have nearly superseded papyrus, which was brittle and more perishable. A very few books of the seventh century have leaves of parchment and papyrus mixed, that the former costly material might strengthen and support the friable paper. About the eleventh century it grew worse, and a dirty colored parchment is evidence of a want of antiquity. This may possibly arise from the circumstances that writers of this time prepared their own parchment, and they were probably not so skilled as manufacturers. A curious passage from a sermon of Hildebert, Archbishop of Tours, who was born in 1054, is a voucher for this fact. The sermon is on the "Book of Life," which he recommends his hearers to obtain:
'Do you know what a writer does? He first cleanses his parchment from the grease, and takes off the principal part of the dirt; then he entirely rubs off the hair and fibres with pumice stone; if he did not do so, the letters written upon it would not be good, nor would they last long. He then rules lines that the writing may be straight. All these things you ought to do, if you wish to possess the book which I have been displaying to you.'
At this time parchment was a very costly material. We find it mentioned that Gui, Count of Nevers, having sent a valuable present of plate to the Chartreux of Paris, the unostentatious monks returned it with a request that he would send them parchment instead."
WHEN it was that the great change occurred and true paper made of fibrous matter or rags reduced to a pulp in water was invented has been a subject of considerable thought and investigation. Munsell, in his "Chronology of Paper and Paper-Making," credits it to the Chinese, and estimates its date to be included in the first century of the Christian era. He observes:
"The Chinese paper is commonly supposed to be made of silk; but this is a mistake. Silk by itself cannot be reduced to a pulp suitable for making paper. Refuse silk is said to be occasionally used with other ingredients, but the greater part of the Chinese paper is made from the inner bark of the bamboo and mulberry tree, called by them the paper tree, hempen rags, etc. The latter are prepared for paper by being cut and well washed in tanks. They are then bleached and dried; in twelve days they are converted into a pulp, which is then made into balls of about four pounds weight. These are afterwards saturated with water, and made into paper on a frame of fine reeds; and are dried by being pressed under large stones. A second drying operation is performed by plastering the sheets on the walls of a room. The sheets are then coated with gum size, and polished with stones. They also make paper from cotton and linen rags, and a coarse yellow sort from rice straw, which is used for wrapping. They are enabled to make sheets of a large size, the mould on which the pulp is made into paper being sometimes ten or twelve feet long and very wide, and managed by means of Pulleys.
"The Japanese prepare paper from the mulberry as follows: in the month of December the twigs are cut into lengths not exceeding thirty inches and put together in bundles. These fagots are then placed upright in a large vessel containing alkaline ley, and boiled till the bark shrinks so as to allow about a half an inch of the wood to appear free at the top. After they are thus boiled they are exposed to a cool atmosphere, and laid away for future use. When a sufficient quantity has been thus collected, it is soaked in water three or four days, when a blackish skin which covered it is scraped off. At the same time also the stronger bark which is of a full year's growth is separated from the thinner, which covered the younger branches, and which yields the best and whitest paper. After it has been sufficiently cleansed out and separated, it must be boiled in clear ley, and if stirred frequently it soon becomes of a suitable nature.
"It is then washed, a process requiring much attention and great skill and judgment; for if it be not washed long enough, although strong and of good body, will be coarse and of little value; if washed too long it will afford a white paper, but will be spongy and unfit for writing upon. Having been washed until it becomes a soft and woolly pulp, it is spread upon a table and beat fine with a mallet. It is then put into a tub with an infusion of rice and breni root, when the whole is stirred until the ingredients are thoroughly mixed in a mass of proper consistence. The moulds on which sheets are formed are made of reeds cut into narrow strips instead of wire, and the process of dipping is like that of other countries. After being allowed to remain a short time in heaps under a slight pressure, the sheets are exposed to the sun, by which they are properly dried.
"The Arabians in the seventh century appear to have either discovered or to have learned from the Chinese or Hindoos, quite likely from the latter, the art of making paper from cotton; for it is known that a manufactory of such paper was established at Samarcand about the year 706 A. D, The Arabians seem to have carried the art to Spain, and to have there made paper from linen and hemp as well as from cotton.
"The art of manufacturing paper from cotton is supposed to have found its way into Europe in the eleventh century. The first paper of that kind was made of raw cotton; but its manufacture was by the Arabians extended to old worn-out cotton, and even to the smallest pieces it is said. But as there are cotton plants of various kinds, it was natural that they should produce papers of different qualities; and it was impossible to unite their woolly particles so firmly as to form a strong substantial paper, for want of sufficient skill and proper machinery, using as they did mortars and rude horse-mills. The Greeks, it is said, made use of cotton paper before the Latins. It came into Germany through Venice and was called Greek parchment.
"The Moors, who were the paper-makers of Spain, having been expelled by the Spaniards, the latter, acquainted with water mills, improved the manufacture so as to produce a paper from cotton nearly equal to that made of linen rags."
A chronology of paper relating to the earliest specimens of them can also be found in Munsell's work on that subject; several are here cited:
"A. D. 704. The Arabians are supposed to have acquired the knowledge of making paper of cotton, by their conquests in Tartary.
"A. D. 706. Casiri, a Spanish author, attributes the invention of cotton paper to Joseph Amru, in this year, at Mecca; but it is well known that the Chinese and Persians were acquainted with its manufacture before this period.
"A. D. 900. The bulls of the popes in the eighth and ninth centuries were written upon cotton paper.
"A. D. 900. Montfaucon, who on account of his diligence and the extent of his researches is great authority, wrote a dissertation to prove that charta bombycine, cotton paper, was discovered in the empire of the east toward the end of the ninth or beginning of the tenth century.
"A. D. 1007. The plenarium, or inventory, of the treasure of the church of Sandersheim, is written upon paper of cotton, bearing this date.
"A. D. 1049. The oldest manuscript in England written upon cotton paper, is in the Bodleian collection of the British Museum, having this date.
"A. D. 1050. The most ancient manuscript on cotton paper, that has been discovered in the Royal Library at Paris having a date, bears record of this year.
"A. D. 1085. The Christian successors of Moorish paper-makers at Toledo in Spain, worked the paper-mills to better advantage than their predecessors. Instead of manufacturing paper of raw cotton, which is easily recognized by its yellowness and brittleness, they made it of rags, in moulds through which the water ran off; for this reason it was called parchment cloth.
"A. D. 1100. The Aphorisms of Hippocrates, in Arabia, the manuscript of which bears this date, has been pronounced the oldest specimen of linen paper that has come to light.
"A. D. 1100. Arabic manuscripts were at this time written on satin paper, and embellished with a quantity of ornamental work, painted in such gay and resplendent colors that the reader might behold his face reflected as if from a mirror.
"A. D. 1100. There was a diploma of Roger, king of Sicily, dated 1145, in which be says that he had renewed on parchment a charter that had been written on cotton paper in 1100.
"A. D. 1102. The king of Sicily appears to have accorded a diploma to an ancient family of paper-makers who had established a manufactory in that island, where cotton was indigenous, and this has been thought to point to the origin of cotton paper, quite erroneously.
"A. D. 1120. Peter the Venerable, abbot of Clum, who flourished about this time, declared that paper from linen rags was in use in his day.
"A. D. 1150. Edrisi, who wrote at this time, tells us that the paper made at Xativa, an ancient city of Valencia, was excellent, and was exported to countries east and west.
"A. D. 1151. An Arabian author certifies that very fine white cotton paper was manufactured in Spain, and Cacim aben Hegi assures us that the best was made at Xativa. The Spaniards being acquainted with water-mills, improved upon the Moorish method of grinding the raw cotton and rags; and by stamping the latter in the mill, they produced a better pulp than from raw cotton, by which various sorts of paper were manufactured, nearly equal to those made from linen rags.
"A. D. 1153. Petrus Mauritius (the Abbi de Cluni), who died in this year, has the following passage on paper in his Treatise against the Jews; 'The books we read every day are made of sheep, goat, or calf skin; or of rags (ex rasauris veterum pannorum),' supposed to allude to modern paper.
"A. D. 1178. A treaty of peace between the kings of Aragon and Castile is the oldest specimen of linen paper used in Spain with a date. It is supposed that the Moors, on their settlement in Spain, where cotton was scarce, made paper of hemp and flax. The inventor of linen-rag paper, whoever he was, is entitled to the gratitude of posterity.
"A. D. 1200. Casiri positively affirms that there are manuscripts in the Escurial palace near Madrid, upon both cotton and hemp paper, written prior to this time."
Abdollatiph, an Arabian physician, who visited Egypt in 1200, says that the linen mummy-cloths were habitually used to make wrapping paper for the shopkeepers.
A document with the seals preserved dated A. D. 1239 and signed by Adolphus, count of Schaumburg is written on linen paper. It is preserved in the university of Rinteln, Germany, and establishes the fact that linen paper was already in use in Germany.
Specimens of flax paper and still extant are quite numerous, a very few of them having dates included in the eighth and ninth centuries.
The charta Damascena, so-called from the fact of its manufacture in the city of Damascus, was in use in the eighth century. Many Arabian MSS. on such a paper exist dating from the ninth century.
The charta bombycina (bombyx, a silk and cotton paper) was much employed during mediaeval periods.
The microscope, however, has demonstrated conclusively many things formerly in doubt and relating particularly to the matter of the character of fibre used in paper-making. One of the most important is the now established fact that there is no difference between the fibres of the old cotton and linen papers, as made from rags so named.
To ascertain the precise period and the particular nation of Europe, when and among whom the use of our common paper fabricated from linen rags first originated, was a very earnest object of research with the learned Meerman, author of a now exceedingly rare work on this subject and published in 1767. His mode of inquiry was unique. He proposed a reward of twenty-five golden ducats, to whoever should discover what on due examination should appear to be the most ancient manuscript or public document inscribed on paper manufactured from linen rags. This proposal was distributed through all parts of Europe. His little volume contains the replies which Meerman received. The scholars who remitted the result of their investigations were unable to distinguish between what they estimated as cotton or linen rags. They did, however, establish the fact that paper made of linen rags existed before 1308, and some of them even sought to give the honor of the invention to Germany. They also asserted that the most ancient English specimen of such a paper belonged to the year 1342.
The transformation of paper made from every conceivable fibrous material into what is commonly known as "linen" or true paper was of slow growth until after the invention of printing. Following that great event it is surprising, how, in so short a period, the manufacturers of paper improved its quality and the degree of excellence which it later attained. They imitated the old vellum so closely that it was even called vellum and is so known to this day. This class of paper was employed both for writing and printing purposes and has never been excelled, surpassing any like productions of modern times.
A curious custom came into vogue during the early infancy of the "linen" paper industry, which is of so much interest and possesses so curious a history as to be well worth mentioning. It is the water mark as it is commonly but erroneously termed in connection with paper manufacture.
Its origin dates back to the thirteenth century, though the monuments indicating its use before the time of printing are but few in number.
The real employment of the water mark may be said to have commenced at the time when it was a custom of the first printers to omit their names from their works. Also, it is to be considered that at this period comparatively few people could either read or write and therefore pictures, designs or other marks were employed to enable them to distinguish the paper of one manufacturer from another. These marks as they became common naturally gave their names to the different sorts of paper.
The earliest known water mark on linen paper represented a picture of a tower and was of the date of 1293. The next known water mark which can be designated is a ram's head and is found in a book of accounts belonging to an official of Bordeaux which was then subject to England. It is dated 1330.
In the fifteenth century there were no distinctions in the quality of paper used for manuscripts or for books. In the Mentz Bible of 1462 are to be found no less than three sorts of paper. Of this Bible, the water mark in some sheets is a bull's head simply, and in others a bull's head from whose forehead rises a long line, at the end of which is a cross. In other sheets the water mark is a bunch of grapes.
In 1498 the water mark of paper consisted of an eight pointed star within a double circle. The design of an open hand with a star at the top which was in use as early as 1530, probably gave the name to what is still called hand paper.
It appears that even so high a personage as Henry VIII of England in 1540 utilized the water mark in order to show his contempt for and animosity to Pope Paul III, with whom he had then quarreled, gave orders for the preparation of paper, the water mark of which was a hog with a miter: this he used for his private correspondence.
A little later, about the middle of the sixteenth century, the favorite paper mark was the jug or pot, from which would appear to have originated the term pot paper. Still another belonging to this period was the device of a glove.
At the beginning of the seventeenth century, the device was a fool's cap and which has continued by name as the particular size which we now designate fool's cap.
The water mark has continued to increase in popularity and to-day may be found in almost any kind of paper, either in the shape of designs, figures, numbers or names.
The circumstance of the water mark has at various times been the means of detecting frauds, forgeries and impositions in our courts of law and elsewhere. The following is introduced as a whimsical example of such detections and is said to have occurred in the fifteenth century, and is related by Beloe, London, 1807:
"The monks of a certain monastery at Messina exhibited to a visitor with great triumph, a letter which they claimed had been written in ink by the Virgin Mary with her own hand, not on the ancient papyrus, but on paper made of rags. The visitor to whom it was shown observed with affected solemnity, that the letter involved also a miracle because the paper on which it was written could not have been in existence until over a thousand years after her death."
An interesting example of the use of water marks on paper for fraudulent purposes is to be found in a pamphlet entitled "Ireland's Confessions." This person, a son of Samuel Ireland, who was a distinguished draughtsman and engraver, about the end of the eighteenth century fabricated a pretended Shakespeare MSS., which as a literary forgery was the most remarkable of its time. Previous to his confessions it had been accepted by the Shakespearean scholars as unquestionably the work of the immortal bard. The following is a citation from his Confessions:
"Being thus urged forward to the production of more manuscripts, it became necessary that I should posses; a sufficient quantity of old paper to enable me to proceed; in consequence of which I applied to a book-seller named Verey, in Great May's buildings, St. Martin's Lane, who, for the sum of five shillings, suffered me to take from all the folio and quarto volumes in his shop the fly leaves which they contained. By this means I was amply stored with that commodity—nor did I fear any mention of the circumstance by Mr. Verey, whose quiet, unsuspecting disposition, I was well convinced, would never lead him to make the transaction public; in addition to which, he was not likely even to know anything concerning the supposed Shakespearean discovery by myself, and even if he had, I do not imagine that my purchase of the old paper in question would have excited in him the smallest degree of suspicion. As I was fully aware, from the variety of water-marks, which are in existence at the present day, that they must have constantly been altered since the period of Elizabeth and being for some time wholly unacquainted with the water-marks of that age, I very carefully produced my first specimens of the writing on such sheets of old paper as had no marks whatever. Having heard it frequently stated that the appearance of such marks on the papers would have greatly tended to establish their validity, I listened attentively to every remark which was made upon the subject, and from thence I at length gleaned the intelligence that a jug was the prevalent water-mark of the reign of Elizabeth; in consequence of which I inspected all the sheets of old paper then in my possession, and having selected such as had the jug upon them, I produced the succeeding manuscripts upon these, being careful, however, to mingle with them a certain number of blank leaves, that the production on a sudden of so many water-marks might not excite suspicion in the breasts of those persons who were most conversant with the manuscripts."
Fuller, writing in 1662, characterizes the paper of his day:
"Paper participates in some sort of the character of the country which makes it; the Venetian being neat, subtle, and court-like; the French light, slight, and slender; and the Dutch thick, corpulent, and gross, sticking up the ink with the sponginess thereof. And he complains of the 'vast sums of money expended in our land for paper out of Italy, France, and Germany, which might be lessened were it made in our nation.' "
Ulman Strother in 1390 started his paper mill at Nuremberg in Bavaria which was the first paper mill known to have been established in Germany, and is said to have been the only one in Europe then manufacturing paper from linen rags.
Among the privy expenses of Henry VII of the year 1498 appears the following entry: "A reward given to the paper mill, 16s. 8d." This is probably the paper mill mentioned by Wynkin de Worde, the father of English typography. It was located at Hertford, and the water mark he employed was a star within a double circle.
The manufacture of paper in England previous to the revolution of 1688 was an industry of very small proportions, most of the paper being imported from Holland.
The first paper mill established in America was by William Rittenhouse who emigrated from Holland and settled in Germantown, Pa., in 1690. At Roxborough, near Philadelphia, on a stream afterwards called Paper Mill run, which empties into the Wissahicken river, was located the site which in company with William Bradford, a printer, he chose for his mill. The paper was made from linen rags, mostly the product of flax raised in the vicinity and made first into wearing apparel.
It was Reaumer, who in 1719 first suggested the possibility of paper being made from wood. He obtained his information on this subject from examination of wasps' nests.
Matthias Koops in 1800 published a work on "Paper" made from straw, wood and other substances. His second edition appeared in 1801 and was composed of old paper re-made into new. Another work on the subject of "Paper from Straw, &c.," by Piette, appeared in 1835, which said work contains more than a hundred pages, each one of which was made from a different kind of material.
Many other valuable works are obtainable which treat of rag paper manufacture and the stories they tell are instructive as well as interesting.
PAPER manufacturers have tried all the pulp-making substances. This statement to the unlearned must seem curious, because in the very early times they were content with a single material and that did not even require to be first made into the form of pulp. When the supply of papyrus failed, it was rags which they substituted. By the simplest processes they produced a paper with which our best cannot compare. In some countries great care is exercised in selecting the quality of paper for official use, in others none at all.
What will be the state of our archives a few hundred years hence, if they be not continually recopied?
Some of the printed paper rots even more quickly than written.
The late Pope at one time invited many of the savants, chemists and librarians of Europe, to meet at Einsiedlen Abbey in Switzerland. He requested that the subject of their discussions should be both ink and paper. He volunteered the information, already known to the initiated, that the records of this generation in his custody and under his control were fast disappearing and unless the writing materials were much improved he estimated that they would entirely disappear. It is stated that at this meeting the Pope's representative submitted a number of documents from the Vatican archives which are scarcely decipherable though dated in the nineteenth century. In a few of those of dates later than 1873 the paper was so tender that unless handled with exceptional care, it would break in pieces like scorched paper.
These conditions are in line with many of those which prevail with few exceptions in every country, town or hamlet.
A contributory cause as we know is a class of poor and cheap inks now in almost universal use. The other is the so-called "modern" or wood-pulp paper in general vogue.
Reaumur, as already stated, back in 1719 suggested from information gathered in examinations of wasps' nests, that a paper might be manufactured from wood. This idea does not appear to have been acted upon until many years later, although in the interim inventors were exhausting their ingenuity in the selection of fibrous materials from which paper might be manufactured.
The successful introduction of wood as a substitute for or with rags in paper manufacture until about 1870 was of slow growth; since which time vast quantities have been employed. In this country alone millions of tons of raw material are being imported to say nothing of home products.
Its value in the cause of progress of some arts which contribute greatly to our comfort and civilization cannot be overestimated, but nevertheless the wood paper is bound to disintegrate and decay, and the time not very far distant either. Hence, its use for records of any kind is always to be condemned.
There are three classes of wood pulp; mechanical wood, soda process, and the sulphite. The first or mechanical wood is a German invention of 1844, where the logs after being cut up into proper blocks, were then ground against a moving millstone against which they were pressed and with the aid of flowing water reduced to a pulpy form. This pulp was transported into suitable tanks and then pumped to the "beaters."
The soda process wood and sulphite wood pulp are both made by chemical processes. The first was invented by Meliner in 1865. The preparation of pulp by this process consists briefly in first cutting up the logs into suitable sections and throwing them into a chipping machine. The chips are then introduced into tanks containing a strong solution of caustic soda and boiled under pressure.
The sulphite process is substantially the same except that the chips are thrown into what are called digesters and fed with the chemicals which form an acid sulphite. The real inventor of this latter process is not known.
The chemicals employed in both of these processes compel a separation of the resinous matters from the cell tissues or cellulose. These products are then treated in the manufacturing of paper with few variations, the same as the ordinary rag pulp.
These now perfected processes are the results of long and continuing experimentations made by many inventors.
The following paper was read before the London Society of Arts by Mr. Alfred Glyde, in May, 1850, and is equally applicable to some of the wood paper of the present day:
"Owing to the imperfections formerly existing in the microscope, little was known of the real nature of the plants called fungi until within the last few years, but since the improvements in that instrument the subject of the development, growth, and offices of the fungi has received much attention. They compose, with the algae and lichens, the class of thallogens (Lindley), the algae existing in water, the other two in air only. A fungus is a cellular flowerless plant, fructifying solely by spores, by which it is propagated, and the methods of attachment of which are singularly various and beautiful. The fungi differs from the lichens and algae in deriving their nourishment from the substances on which they grow, instead of from the media in which they live. They contain a larger quantity of nitrogen in their constitution than vegetables generally do, and the substance called 'fungine' has a near resemblance to animal matter. Their spores are inconceivably numerous and minute, and are diffused very widely, developing themselves wherever they find organic matter in a fit state. The principal conditions required for their growth are moisture, heat, and the presence of oxygen and electricity. No decomposition or development of fungi takes place in dry organic matter, a fact illustrated by the high state of preservation in which timber has been found after the lapse of centuries, as well as by the condition of mummy-cases, bandages, etc., kept dry in the hot climate of Egypt. Decay will not take place in a temperature below that of the freezing point of water, nor without oxygen, by excluding which, is contained in the air, meat and vegetables may be kept fresh and sweet for many years.
"The action which takes place when moist vegetable substances are exposed to oxygen is that of slow combustion ('eremacausis'), the oxygen uniting with the wood and liberating a volume of carbonic acid equal to itself, and another portion combining with the hydrogen of the wood to form water. Decomposition takes place on contact with a body already undergoing the same change, in the same manner that yeast causes fermentation. Animal matter enters into combination with oxygen in precisely the same way as vegetable matter, but as, in addition to carbon and hydrogen, it contains nitrogen, the products of the eremacausis are more numerous, being carbon and nitrate of ammonia, carburetted and sulphuretted hydrogen, and water, and these ammoniacal salts greatly favor the growth of fungi. Now paper consists essentially of woody fibre, having animal matter as size on its surface. The first microscopic symptom of decay in paper is irregularity of surface, with a slight change of color, indicating the commencement of the process just noticed, during which, in addition to carbonic acid, certain organic acids are formed, as crenic and ulmic acids, which, if the paper has been stained by a coloring matter, will form spots of red on the surface. The same process of decay goes on in parchment as in paper, only with more rapidity, from the presence of nitrogen in its composition. When this decay has begun to take place, fungi are produced, the most common species being Penicilium glaucum. They insinuate themselves between the fibre, causing a freer admission of air, and consequently hasten the decay. The substances most successfully used as preventives of decay are the salts of mercury, copper, and zinc. Bichloride of mercury (corrosive sublimate) is the material employed in the kyanization of timber, the probable mode of action being its combination with the albumen of the wood, to form an insoluble compound not susceptible of spontaneous decomposition, and therefore incapable of exciting fermentation. The antiseptic power of corrosive sublimate may be easily tested by mixing a little of it with flour paste, the decay of which, and the appearance of fungi, are quite prevented by it. Next to corrosive sublimate in antiseptic value stand the salts of copper and zinc. For use in the preservation of paper the sulphate of zinc is better than the chloride, which is to a certain extent delinquescent."
There are numerous paper tests which include the matter of sizing, direction of the grain, absorbing powers, character of ingredients, etc. A few of them are cited.
SIZING.—The everyday tests as to hardness of sizing answer every ordinary purpose: Moisten with the tongue, and if the paper is slack-sized you can detect it often by the instant drawing or absorption of the moisture. Watch the spot moistened, and the longer it remains wet the better the paper is sized. Look through the spot dampened—the poorer the sizing the more transparent is the paper where it is wet. If thoroughly sized no difference will be apparent between the spot dampened and the balance of the sheet. When there is a question as to whether a paper is tub or engine sized, it can be usually decided by wetting the forefinger and thumb and pressing the sheet between them. If tub-sized, the glue which is applied to the surface will perceptibly cling to the fingers.
TO TEST THE INK RESISTING QUALITY OF PAPER.— Draw a heavy ink line across the sheet. If the paper is poorly sized, a feathery edge will appear, caused by spreading of the ink. Slack-sized paper will be penetrated by the ink, which will plainly appear on the reverse side of the sheet.
TO DETERMINE THE DIRECTION OF THE GRAIN.— An easy but sure test to determine the direction of the grain in a sheet of paper, which will be found useful and worth remembering, is as follows:
For instance, the size of sheet is 17x22 inches. Cut out a circular piece as nearly round as the eye can judge; before entirely detaching from the sheet, mark on the circle the 17-inch way and the 22-inch way; then float the cut out piece on water for a few seconds; then place on the palm of the hand, taking care not to let the edges stick to the hand, and the paper will curl until it forms a cone; the grain of the paper runs the opposite way from which the paper curls.
ABSORBING POWERS OF BLOTTING PAPER.—Comparative tests as to absorbing powers of blotting can be made between sheets of same weight per ream by allowing the pointed corner of a sheet to touch the surface of a drop of ink. Repeat with each sheet to be tested, and compare the height in each to which the ink has been absorbed. A well-made blotting paper should have little or no free fibre dust to fill with ink and smear the paper.
TEST FOR GROUND WOOD.—Make a streak across the paper with a solution of aniline sulphate or with concentrated nitric acid; the first will turn ground wood yellow, the second will turn it brown. I give aniline sulphate the preference, as nitric acid acts upon unbleached sulphite, if present in the paper, the same as it acts upon ground wood, viz., turning it brown.
Phloroglucin gives a rose-red stain on paper containing (sulphite) wood pulp, after the specimen has been previously treated with a weak solution of hydrochloric acid.
About the end of the eighteenth century it became necessary to make special papers denominated "safety paper." Their manufacture has continued until the present day although much limited, largely because of the employment of mechanical devices which seek to safety monetary instruments. Such safety papers are of several kinds.
1. Paper made with distinguishing marks to indicate proprietorship, as with the Bank of England water mark, to imitate which is a felony. Or the paper of the United States currency, which has silk fibers united with the pulp, the imitation of which is a felony.
2. Paper made with layers or materials which are disturbed by erasure or chemical discharge of written or printed contents, so as to prevent fraudulent tampering.
3. Paper made of peculiar materials or color, to prevent copying by photographic means.
A number of processes may be cited:
One kind is made of a pulp tinged with a stain easily affected by chlorine, acids, or alkalis, and is made into sheets as usual.
Water marks made by wires twined among the meshes of the wire cloth on which the paper is made.
Threads embodied in the web of the paper. Colored threads systematically arranged were formerly used in England for post-office envelopes and exchequer bills.
Silken fibers mixed with the pulp or dusted upon it in process of formation, as used in the United States currency.
Tigere, 1817, treated the pulp of the paper, previous to sizing, with a solution of prussiate of potash.
Sir Win. Congreve, 1819, prepared a colored layer of pulp in combination with white layers, also by printing upon one sheet and covering it with an outer layer, either plain or water-marked.
Glynn and Appel, 1821, mixed a copper salt in the pulp and afterward added an alkali or alkaline salt to produce a copious precipitate. The pulp was then washed and made into paper and thereafter dipped in a saponaceous compound.
Stevenson, 1837, incorporated into paper a metallic base such as manganese, and a neutral compound like prussiate of potash, to protect writing from being tampered with.
Varnham, 1845, invented a paper consisting of a white sheet or surface on one or both sides of a colored sheet.
Stones, 1851. An iodide or bromide in connection with ferrocyanide of potassium and starch combined with the pulp.
Johnson, 1853, employed the rough and irregular surface produced by the fracture of cast iron or other brittle metal to form a water mark for paper by taking an impression therefrom on soft metal, gutta- percha, etc., and afterward transferring it to the wire cloth on which the paper is made.
Scoutteten, 1853, treated paper with caoutchoue dissolved in bisulphide of carbon, in order to render it impermeable and to prevent erasures or chemical action.
Ross, 1854, invented water-lining or printing the denomination of the note in colors while the pulp was yet soft.
Evans, 1854, commingled a lace or open-work fabric in the pulp.
Courboulay, 1856, mixed the pulp and applied to the paper salts of iodine or bromine.
Loubatieres, 1857, manufactured paper in layers, any or all of which might be colored, or have impressions or conspicuous marks for preventing forgery.
Herapath, 1858, saturated paper during or after its manufacture with a solution of a ferrocyanide, a ferriccyanide, or sulphocyanide of potassium, sodium, or ammonium.
Seys and Brewer, 1858, applied aqueous solutions of ferrocyanide of potassium or other salts, which formed an indelible compound with the ferruginous base of writing ink.
Sparre, 1859, utilized opaque matter, such as prussian blue, white or red lead, insoluble in water and stenciled on one layer of the paper web, forming a regular pattern; this was then covered by a second layer of paper.
Moss, 1859, invented a coloring matter prepared from burned china or other clay, oxide of chromium or sulphur, and combined it with the pulp.
Barclay, 1859, incorporated with the paper:
1. Soluble ferrocyanides, ferricyanides, and sulphocyanides of various metals, by forming dibasic salts with potassium, sodium, or ammonium, in conjunction with vegetable, animal, or metallic coloring matters.
2. Salts of manganese, lead, or nickel not containing ferrocyanogen.
3. Ferrocyanides, etc., of potassium, sodium, and ammonium, in conjunction with insoluble salts of manganese, lead, or nickel.
Hooper, 1860. Employed oxides of iron, either alone or dissolved in an acid, and mixed with the pulp.
Nissen, 1860. Treated paper with a preparation of iron, together with ammonia, prussiate of potash and chlorine, while in the pulp or being sized.
Middleton, 1860. Joined together one portion of a bank note printed upon one sheet of thin paper and the other part on another; the two were then cemented together by india-rubber, gutta-percha, or other compound. The interior printing could be seen through its covering sheet, so that the whole device on the note appeared on its face.
Olier, 1861. Employed several layers of paper of various materials and colors; the middle one was colored with a deleble dye, whose color was changed by the application of chemicals to the outer layer.
Olier, 1863. Prepared a paper of three layers of different thicknesses, the central one having an easily removable color, and the external layers were charged with silicate of magnesia or other salt.
Forster and Draper, 1864. Treating paper during or after manufacture with artificial ultramarine and Prussian blue or other metallic compound.
Hayward, 1864. Incorporated threads of fibrous materials of different colors or characters into and among the pulp.
Loewenberg, 1866. Introduced prussiate of potash and oxalic acid or such other alkaline salts or acids into the pulp, in order to indicate fraud in the removal of cancellation stamps or written marks.
Casilear, 1868. Printed numbers on a fugitive ground, tint or color in order to prevent alteration of figures or numbers.
Jameson, 1870. Printed on paper, designs with ferrocyanide of potassium and then soaked the paper when dry in a solution of oxalic acid in alcohol.
Duthie, 1872. Made a ground work of writing ink of different colors by any known means of pen ruling.
Syms, 1876. Produced graduated colored stains, which were made to partially penetrate and spread in the pulp web.
Van Nuys, 1878. Colored the Paper with a pigment and then printed designs with a soluble sulphide.
Casilear, 1878. United two distinctive colored papers, one a fugitive and the other a permanent color.
Hendrichs, 1879. Dipped ordinary paper in an aqueous solution of sulphate of copper and carbonate of ammonia and then added alkaline solutions of cochineal or equivalent coloring matter.
Nowlan, 1884. Backed the ordinary chemical paper with a thin sheet of waterproof paper.
Menzies, 1884. Introduced iodide and iodate of potassium or their equivalents into paper.
Clapp, 1884. Saturated paper with gallo-tanic acid, but the ink used on this paper contained ferri-sesquichloride or other similar preparation of iron.
Hill, 1885. Introduced into paper, ferrocyanide of manganese and hydrated peroxide of iron.
Schreiber, 1885. Colored paper material with indigo and with a subsequent treatment of chromates soluble only in alcohol.
Schreiber, 1885. Treated finished paper with ferric- oxide salts and with ferrocyanides insoluble in water but soluble in acids.
Schlumberger, 1890. Impregnated white paper with a resinated ferrous salt, a resin compound of plumbic ferrocyanide, and a resin compound of ferrocyanide of manganese in combination with a salt of molybdenum and a resin compound of zinc sulphide.
Schlumberger, 1893. Dyed first the splash fibers and mixed them with the paper pulp. Second. He also treated portions of the surface with an alkali, so as to form lines or characters thereon, then immersed the same in a weak acid, in order to produce water-mark lines.
Carvalho, 1894. 1. Charged the paper with bismuth iodide and sodium iodide. 2. Charged the paper with a bismuth salt and iodide of soda in combination with primulin, congo red or other pigment. 3. Charged the paper with a benzidine dye and an alkaline iodide.
1895. Applied a compound, sensitive to ink erasing chemicals, AFTER the writing has been placed on the paper.
Hoskins and Weis, 1895, a safety paper having added thereto a soluble ferrocyanide and a per-salt of iron insoluble in water but decomposable by a weak acid in the presence of a soluble ferrocyanide, as and for the purpose described. (2) A safety paper having added thereto a ferrocyanide soluble in water, a per-salt of iron insoluble in water but easily decomposed by weak acids in the presence of a ferrocyanide soluble in water, and a salt of manganese easily decomposed by alkalis or bleaching agents, substantially as described.
A review of the various processes for treatment of paper in pulp or when finished, demonstrates that time, money and study has been devoted to the production of a REAL safety paper. Some compositions and processes have in a measure been successful. It is found, however, that the ingenuity of those evil-minded persons, to the detection of whose efforts to alter the writing in documents this class of invention has more particularly been directed, finds a ready way of removing in some cases the evidence which the chemical reagent furnishes. This being true most of them have become obsolete, having entirely failed to accomplish the purposes for which they were invented.
There are but three so-called safety papers now on the market, if we exclude those possessing printed designs in fugitive colors.
It is a strange anomaly, nevertheless it is true, that 90 per cent or more of the "raised" checks, notes, or other monetary instruments which were in their original condition written on ordinary or so-called safety paper, never could have been successfully "put through" but for the gross and at times criminal negligence of their writers by the failure to adopt precautions of the very simplest kinds, and thereby avoided placing temptation in the way of many who under other circumstances would never have thought of becoming forgers.
There is no safety paper, safety ink, or mechanical appliance which will prevent the insertion of words or figures before other words or figures if a blank space be left where the forger can place them.
ARTIFICIAL INK AND PAPER OWE THEIR INVENTION TOTHE WASP—PHoeNICIA, "LAND OF THE PURPLE-DYE"—LINES, ADDRESSED TO THE PHoeNICIAN—OLDESTEXISTING PIECE OF LITERARY COMPOSITION—WHEREPAPYRUS STILL GROWS—DU CANGE'S LINES ON THESTYLUS—MATERIALS USED TO PROMULGATE ANCIENTLAWS OF GREECE—ANCIENT METHOD OF WRITINGWILLS—MATERIALS EMPLOYED IN ANCIENT HEBREWROLLS—ANTIQUITY OF EXISTING HEBREW WRITING—OLDEST SPECIMEN OF GREEK WAX WRITING—WOODEN TALLIES AS EMPLOYED IN ENGLAND—WHENWRITING IN GOLD CEASED—DATE OF THE FIRST DISCOVERYOF GREEK PAPYRUS IN EGYPT—PERIODS TOWHICH BELONG VARIOUS STYLES OF WRITING—ANECDOTEAND POEM ABOUT THE FIRST GOLD PEN—INTERESTINGNOTES ABOUT PENS AND INK-HORNS—EMPLOYMENTOF THE PEN AS A BADGE IN THE FOURTEENTHCENTURY—SOME LINES BY COCKER—THE OLDESTEXISTING WRITTEN DOCUMENTS OF RUSSIA—WHENSEALING WAX WAS FIRST EMPLOYED—PLINY'SDESCRIPTION OF THE DIFFERENT KINDS OF PAPYRUSPAPER—MODE OF PRESERVING THE ANCIENT PAPYRUSROLLS—SUGGESTIONS RESPECTING USES OF INK—COMPARATIVE TABLE ABOUT COAL TAR AND ITS BY-PRODUCTS—COMPOSITIONS OF SECRET INKS AND HOWTO RENDER THEM VISIBLE—CHARACTER OF INK EMPLOYEDFOR MANY YEARS BY THE WASHINGTON PATENTOFFICE—FACTS ELICITED BY HERAPATH IN THE UNROLLMENTOF A MUMMY—LINES FROM SHAKESPEAREAND PERSEUS—SEVENTEENTH CENTURY OBSERVATIONSABOUT SECRET INKS—CAUSE OF THE DESTRUCTIONOF MANY ANCIENT MSS.—METHODS TO BE EMPLOYEDIN THE RESTORATION OF SOME OLD INKS—VARIATIONS IN THE MEANING OF WORDS—THE POUNCEBOX PRECEDED BLOTTING PAPER—SOME OBSERVATIONSABOUT BLOTTING PAPER—ANECDOTE RELATINGTO DR. GALE—WHEN WAFERS WERE INTRODUCED—PERSIAN ANECDOTE ABOUT THE DIVES—EPISODESRESPECTING THE STYLUS—DESCRIPTION BY BELOEOF ANCIENT PERSIC AND ARABIC MSS.—CITATION FROMOLD BOSTON NEWSPAPER AND POEM—METHOD OFCOLLECTING RAGS IN 1807 AND SOME LINES ADDRESSEDTO THE LADIES—METHOD TO PHOTOGRAPHCOLORED INKS—POEM BY ISABELLE HOWE FISKE.
IN considering the important and kindred subjects of "gall" ink and "pulp" paper, we are not to forget the LITTLE things connected with their development and which, indeed, made their invention possible.
The gall-nut contains gallic and gallo-tannic acid, and which acids, in conjunction with an iron salt, forms the sole base of the best ink. This nut is produced by the punctures made on the young buds of branches of certain species of oak trees by the female wasp. This same busy little insect was also the first professional paper maker. She it was who taught us not only the way to change dry wood into a suitable pulp, the kind of size to be used, how to waterproof and give the paper strength, but many more marvelous details appertaining to the manufacture of paper which in their ramifications have proved of inestimable benefit and service to the human race. * * * * * * *
The Greek word "Phoenicia" means literally "the land of the purple dye," and to the Phoenicians is attributed the invention of the art of writing.
"Creator of celestial arts,Thy painted word speaks to the eye;To simple lines thy skill impartsThe glowing spirit's ecstasy."
The oldest piece of literary composition known in the oldest book (roll) in existence is to be found in the celebrated papyrus Prisse, now in the Louvre at Paris. It consists of eighteen pieces in Egyptian hieratic writing, ascribed to about the year B. C. 2500.
While the papyrus plant has almost vanished from Egypt, it still grows in Nubia and Abyssinia. It is related by the Arab traveler, Ibn-Haukal, that in the tenth century, in the neighborhood of Palermo in Sicily, the papyrus plant grew with luxuriance in the Papirito, a stream to which it gave its name.
Du Cange, 1376, cites the following lines from a French metrical romance, written about that time, to show that waxen tablets continued to be occasionally used till a late period:
"Some with antiquated styleIn waxen tablets promptly write;Others with finer pen, the whileForm letters lovelier to the sight."
The laws of Greece were promulgated by means of MSS. on linen, as they were also in Rome, and in addition to linen; cloth and silk were occasionally used. Skins of various kinds of fish, and even the "intestines of serpents" were employed as writing materials. Zonaras states that the fire which took place at Constantinople in the reign of Emperor Basiliscus consumed, among other valuable remains of antiquity, a copy of the Iliad and Odyssey, and some other ancient poems, written in letters of gold upon material formed of the intestines of a serpent. We are also informed by Purcelli that monuments of much more modern dates, the charter of Hugo and Lothaire, A. D. 933 (kings of Italy), preserved in the archives of Milan, are written upon fish skins.
Constantine authorized his soldiers dying on the field of battle to write their last will and testament with the point of their sword on its sheath or on a shield.
B. C. 270. The Jewish elders, by order of the high priest, carried a copy of the law to Ptolemy Philadelphus, written in letters of gold upon skins, the pieces of which were so artfully put together that the joinings did not appear.
No monuments of Hebrew writing exist which are not posterior even to the Christian era, with the exception of those on the coins of the Maccabees, which are in the ancient or what is termed the Samaritan forms of the Hebrew letters. This coinage took place about B. C. 144.
The most ancient specimen of Hebrew ink writing extant is alleged to have been written A. D. 489. It is a parchment roll which was found in a Kariat synagogue in the Crimea. Another, brought from Danganstan, if the superscription be genuine, has a date corresponding with A. D. 580. The date of still another of the celebrated Hebrew scriptural codices, about which there is no dispute, is the Hilel codex written at the end of the sixth century. Its name is said to be derived from the fact that it was written at Hila, a town built near the ruins of the ancient Babel; some maintain, however, that it was named after the man who wrote it.
One of the earliest specimens of Greek (wax) writing is an inscription on a small wooden tablet now in the British museum. It refers to a money transaction of the thirty-first year of Ptolemy Philadelphus, B. C. 254.
In England the custom of using wooden tallies, inscribed as well as notched in the public accounts, lasted down to the nineteenth century.
Gold writing was a practice which died out in the thirteenth century.
The first discovery of Greek papyri in Egypt took place in the year 1778. It is of the (late of A. D. 191 and outside of Egypt and Herculaneum is the only place in which the Greek papyri has ever been found.
Square capital ink writing in Latin of ancient date is found on a few leaves of an MS. of Virgil, which is attributed to the close of the fourth century, and the first rustic MS. to which an approximate date can be given, belongs to the close of the fifth century.
The most ancient uncial ink writing extant, belongs to the fourth century, whilst the earliest mixed uncial and miniscule writing pertains to the sixth century.
The oldest extant Irish MS. in the round Irish hand is ascribed to the latter part of the seventh century, while the earliest specimen of English writing of any kind extant dates about the beginning of the eighth century.
The gold pen won by Peter Bales in his trial of skill with Johnson, during the reign of Queen Elizabeth, if really made for use, is probably the first modern example of such pens. Bales was employed by Sir Francis Walsingham, and afterwards kept a writing school at the upper end of the Old Bailey. In 1595, when nearly fifty years old, he had a trial of skill with one Daniel Johnson, by which he was the winner of a golden pen, of a value of L20, which, in the pride of his victory, he set up as his sign. Upon this occasion John Davis made the following epigram in his "Scourge of Folly:"
"The Hand and Golden Pen, ClophonionSets on his sign, to shew, O proud, poor soul,Both where he wonnes, and how the same he won,From writers fair, though he writ ever foul;But by that Hand, that Pen so borne has been,From place to Place, that for the last half Yeare,It scarce a sen'night at a place is seen.That Hand so plies the Pen, though ne'er the neare,For when Men seek it, elsewhere it is sent,Or there shut up as for the Plague or Rent,Without which stay, it never still could stand,Because the Pen is for a Running Hand."
The sign of the "Hand and Pen" was also used by the Fleet street marriage-mongers, to denote "marriages performed without imposition."
Robert More, a famous writing master, in 1696 lived in Castle street, near St. Paul's churchyard, London, at the sign of the "Golden Pen."
The ink horn in Queen Elizabeth's time was in popular use as a receptacle for holding writing ink, and Petticoat lane in London was the great manufacturing center for them. Bishops Gate in the same vicinity was known as the "home of the scribblers."
Beginning with 1560 and for many years thereafter the sign of the Five Ink Horns was appropriately displayed by Haddon on the house in which he dwelt.
Away back in the time of King Edward III (1313- 1377), royalty was employing the pen, both quill and gold, as badges. This is indicated in the accompanying interesting list to be found in the Harlein library:
"King Edward the iii. gave a lyon in his proper coulor, armed, azure, langue d'or. The oustrich fether gold, the pen gold, and a faucon in his proper coulor and the Sonne Rising.
"The Prince of Wales the ostrich fether pen and all arg.
"Henry, sonne of the Erl of Derby, first Duk of Lancaster, gave the red rose uncrowned, and his ancestors gave the Fox tayle in his prop. coulor and the ostrich fether ar. the pen ermyn.
"The Ostrych fether silver, the pen gobone sylver and azur, is the Duk of Somerset's bage.
"The ostrych fether silver and pen gold ys the kinges.
"The ostrych fether pen and all sylver ys thePrynces.
"The ostrych fether sylver, pen ermyn is theDuke of Lancesters.
"The ostrych fether sylver and pen gobone isthe Duke of Somersets.""What's great Goliath's spear, the sevenfold shield,Scanderbeg's sword, to one who cannot wieldSuch weapons? Or, what means a well cut quill,In th' untaught hand of him that's void of skill?"—COCKER, A. D. 1650.
The oldest ink (Russian) documents that exist in Russia are two treaties with the Greek emperors, made by Oleg, A. D. 912, and Igor, A. D. 943. Christianity, introduced into Russia at the beginning of the eleventh century by Vladimir the Great, brought with it many words of Greek origin. Printing was introduced there about the middle of the sixteenth century. The oldest printed book which has been discovered is a Sclavonic psalter, the date Kiev, 1551, two years after a press was established in Moscow.
It is said that the skins of 300 sheep were used in every copy of the first printed Bible. Hence the old saying, "It takes a flock of sheep to write a book."
What would have been the comment in olden times, to learn that it takes almost a forest of trees to print the Sunday edition of some of our great newspapers?
Wax (shoemakers') was first employed on documents A. D. 1213, although it was white wax which was used to seal the magna charta, granted to the English barons by King John, A. D. 1215. In 1445 red wax was much employed in England, but the earliest specimen of red sealing wax extant is found on a letter dated August 3, 1554.
Pliny enumerates and describes eight different kinds of papyrus paper:
1. Charter hieratica—sacred paper, used only for books on religion. From adulation of Augustus it was also called charta augusta and charta livia.
2. Charta amphitheatrica—from the place where it was fabricated.
3. Charta fannia—from Fannius, the manufacturer.
4. Charta saitica—from Sais in Egypt. This appears to have been a coarser kind.
5. Charta toeniotica—from the place where made, now Damietta. This was also of a less fine quality.
6. Charta claudia. This was an improvement of the charta hieratica, which was too fine.
7. Charta emporitica. A coarse paper for parcels.
There was also a paper called macrocollum, which was of a very large size.
Of all these, he says, the charta claudia was the best.
The ink-written rolls of papyrus were placed vertically in a cylindrical box called capsula. It is very evident that a great number of such volumes might be comprised in this way within a small space, and this may tend to explain the smallness of the rooms which are considered to have been used for containing the ancient libraries.
At Mentz, in Upper Germany, is a leaf of parchment on which are fairly written twelve different kinds of handwritings in six different inks also a variety of miniatures and drawings curiously done with a pen by one Theodore Schubiker, who was born without hands and performed the work with his feet.
In Rome the very plate of brass on which the laws of the ten tables are written is still to be seen.
Stylographic inks should not be used upon records, most of them are aniline. The absence of solid matter, which makes them desirable for the stylographic pen, unfits them for records.
Never add water to ink. While an ink which has water as its base might, under certain conditions bear the addition of an amount equal to that lost by evaporation, as a rule the ink particles which have become injured will not assimilate again.
One of the best methods to cleanse a steel pen after use, is to stick it in a raw (white) potato.
Inks which are recommended as permanent, because water will not remove them, while it does immediately obliterate others, may not be permanent as against time. These inks may be the best for monetary purposes, but, owing to an excess of acid in them, may be dangerous in time to the paper.
It is interesting, since coal tar has acquired so important a position in the arts, to trace how its various products successively rose in value. The prices in Paris, as given by M. Parisal in 1861, are as follows:
Coal,……………………………. 1/4 c. per lb.Coal tar,………………………… 3/4 " "Heavy coal oil,………….. 2 1/2 a 3 3/4 " "Light coal oil,…………. 6 3/4 a 10 1 /4 " "Benzole,…………………… 10 1/2 a 13 " "Crude nitro-benzole,……………. 57 a 61 " "Rectified nitro-benzole,………… 82 a 96 " "Ordinary aniline,…………. $3.27 a $4.90 " "Liquid aniline violet,………….. 28 a 41 " "Carmine aniline violet,……. 32 c. a $1.92 "Pure aniline violet, in powder,…. $245 a $326.88 "
The last is equal to the price of gold. And so, says M. Parisal, from coal, carried to its tenth power, we have gold; the diamond is to come.
Modern chemistry offers many formulas and methods of rendering visible secret or sympathetic inks. Writing made with any of the following solutions, and permitted to dry, is invisible. Treatment by the means cited will render them visible.
Solution. After treatment. Color produced.Acetate of lead. Sulphuret of potassiurin. Brown.Gold in nitrohydroChloric acid. Tin in same acid. Purple.Nut-galls. Sulphate of iron. Black.Dilute sulphuric acid. Heat. Black.Cobalt in dilute Heat. Green.nitrohydrochloric acid.Lemon juice. Heat. Brown.Oxide of copper in Heat. Blue.acetic acid and saltNitrate of bismuth. Infusions of Nutgalls. Brown.Common starch. Iodine in alcohol. Purple.Colorless iodine. Chloride of lime. Brown.Phenolphtalin. Alkaline solution. Red.Vanadium. Pyrogallic acid. Purple.
The Patent Office at Washington, D. C., for more than forty years employed a violet copying ink made of logwood. From 1853 until 1878 it was furnished by the Antoines of Paris, of the brand termed "Imperial;" in later years it was supplied by the Fabers. Since 1896 they have been using "combined" writing fluids.
The following facts elicited by the unrollment of a mummy at Bristol, England, in 1853, were communicated to the Philosophical Magazine, by Dr. Herapath. He says:
"On three of the bandages were hieroglyphical characters of a dark color, as well defined as if written with a modern pen; where the marking fluid had flowed more copiously than the characters required, the texture of the cloth had become decomposed and small holes had resulted. I have no doubt that the bandages were genuine, and had not been disturbed or unfolded; the color of the marks were so similar to those of the present 'marking ink,' that I was induced to try if they were produced by silver. With the blowpipe I immediately obtained a button of that metal; the fibre of the linen I proved by the microscope, and by chemical reagents, to be linen; it is therefore certain that the ancient Egyptians were acquainted with the means of dissolving silver, and of applying it as a permanent ink; but what was their solvent? I know of none that would act on the metal and decompose flax fibre but nitric acid, which we have been told was unknown until discovered by the alchemist in the thirteenth century, which was about 2200 years after the date of this mummy, according as its superscription was read.
"The Yellow color of the fine linen cloths which had not been stained by the embalming materials, I found to be the natural coloring matter of the flax; they therefore did not, if we judge from this specimen, practice bleaching. There were, in some of the bandages near the selvage, some twenty or thirty blue threads; these were dyed by indigo, but the tint was not so deep nor so equal as the work of the modern dyers; the color had been given it in the skein.
"One of the outer bandages was of a reddish color, which dye I found to be vegetable, but could not individualize it; Mr. T. J. Herapath analyzed it for tin and alumina, but could not find any. The face and internal surfaces of the orbits had been painted white, which pigment I ascertained to be finely powdered chalk."
"I am a scribbled form, drawn with a PenUpon a Parchment, and against this fireDo I shrink up."—KING JOHN, v, 7.