RAW MATERIALS PAPER 231 



Proceeding now to the subject-matter, paper and 

 the paper shortage. 



The art of paper-making is amongst the most 

 beautiful which technology has evolved, and will 

 serve as well as any other to illustrate our purpose, 

 viz. the intimate relation existing between the finished 

 product and the process of its manufacture on the one 

 hand, and the properties of the raw material on the 

 other. 



Broadly speaking, paper is a web formed by the 

 maceration of strands of vegetable fibre or of wood 

 so that the unit elements come apart; subsequently 

 these are caused to combine into a felt by precipitation 

 from a watery broth on a woven wire cloth. 



The invention of paper is attributed to the Chinese, 

 and dates back to the early years of the Christian era. 1 

 From China it passed to Samarkand about A.D. 700, 

 and found its way to Spain by the Moors in the 

 eleventh century. Thence it spread over the countries 

 of Europe. One of the earliest extant examples of 

 the use of paper in Europe is a letter from Raymond, 

 son of Raymond, Duke of Narbonne, to Henry III, 

 King of England. The date of this letter, which 

 deals with a matter of no importance, falls between 

 A.D. 1216-1222. It is preserved in the museum of 

 the Public Record Office. The paper of this speci- 

 men, as in the majority of early papers, was made of 

 flax. In other words, the paper trade of those days, 

 as it does in part to-day, depended for its staple raw 

 material on a by-product of civilization, i.e. rags. 



The process of manufacture was rude and simple 

 when compared with that obtaining to-day. The 



i Papyrus, in use at a much earlier date, is not paper in the modern sense. 

 It consisted of longitudinal slices of the pithy stem of the paper reed, Cyperus 

 Papyrus, pressed and dried together, and the surface smoothed to receive the 

 ink. 



