451 
CHEMICAL INVESTIGATION OF ABACA FIBER. 
Ash, alkaline hydrolysis, and cellulose calculated on dry weight. 
Per cent. 
Moisture 8. 10 
Ash 1.08 
Hydrolysis («) 13. 86 
Hydrolysis (>) 20. 79 
Cellulose 73. 68 
Composition of raw abacd fiber (undoubtedly hand stripped). 
[Analysis by Hugo Miiller.25] 
Per cent. 
Cellulose 64. 07 
Fat and wax . 62 
Aqueous extract . 96 
Lignin and pectous substances 21. 60 
Water erie 
Ash 1. 02 
Figures obtained by myself on a sample of machine-stripped fiber. 
Per cent. 
Cellulose 63. 15 
Fat and wax . 66 
Aqueous extract 1. 00 
Lignin and pectous substances 24. 67 
Water 9. 50 
Ash 1. 02 
MICROSCOPIC CHARACTERISTICS OF ABACA FIBER. 
Manufacturers of paper attach considerable importance to the physical 
condition of cellulose after it has been freed from foreign matter and 
otherwise purified by the boiling, washing, and bleaching processes to 
which it has been subjected. 
Some fibers are short, hard, and of polished exterior, while others are long, 
flexible, and barbed; the former, it is scarcely necessary to say, yield but indif- 
ferent papers, easily broken and torn, while papers produced by the latter class 
of fibers are possessed of a great degree of strength and flexibility.” 
According to Watt: 77 
Straw fiber is short, pointed and polished, and can not of itself make a strong 
paper; on the other hand, Manila (abaecé) is the strongest known, and esparto 
fiber holds an intermediate place between these two extremes. 
The dimensions of abaca fiber are included in the table given on 
page 461, together with those of the others examined. For purposes of 
* Griffin and Little: Chemistry of Paper Making, p. 127. 
** Arnot: Journ. Soc. Arts, 26, 74. 
“Art of Paper Making (1901), p. 4, Crosby, Lockwood & Son, London. 
