398 PURPLE DYEING, ANCIENT AND MODERN. 



In 1709 Juspicn made similar rescarcbcs on the French coast — researches 

 which, in the following year, were continued by IJcaumur, who delighted, to make 

 theory and ppccnlation the obedient handmaidens of every day utility. Some- 

 what later the ?oft-shelled molluscs of the Mediterranean shores wore carefully 

 examined by Italian naturalists, and so well has their pains-taking example 

 been followed up that we are now acijuainted with a goodly number of mollnscs 

 that yield the purple dyestuff. For the most part they belong to the families 

 of the Micrcx and the Bucc'minn, of Linnaeus ; and it is thought that the Murex 

 tritncidus, of Linnoeus, (one of the most abounding of the Mediterranean sea- 

 snails,) and the Purpura and Piirptira ptitula, of Lamarck, are identical with 

 Pliny's Buccinum. The Purpura Lapillus is quite common on the European 

 shores, and is believed to have been the most important among the purple sea- 

 snails of antiquity. Lesson thinks that the Jantliina frogdis is the true buc- 

 cinum of antiqiiity. It is a native of the Mediterranean. In stormy weather 

 it is thrown upon the coast of the French department of Ande in such vast 

 numbers as actually to cover the strand. Lesson attributes to Narbonne (the 

 Karhu Martins of the ancients) great skill and celebrity in the art of purplo 

 dyeing in the times of ancient Home. Other writers say that though the Gar- 

 lish purple Avas very splendid, it yet was very evanescent. The janthina un- 

 doubtedly affords a bright and beautiful purple, and w:lien taken oi;t of the water 

 yields the fluid to the average amount of about an ounce. But the fluid is fm*- 

 nished by a gland entirely different from that spoken of by the old writers, a 

 tact which it is difficult to reconcile with the ancient statement. Moreover, the 

 modern purple is very evanescent, while the ancient was valued no less for its 

 durability than for its beauty. Thus, in Plutarch's Life of Alexander the 

 Great, we read that the Greeks found in the treasury of Darius purple stuffs to 

 the value of five thousand talents, and that, though some of them were nearly two 

 centuries old, the color had not at all faded. Lesson says that the coloring fluid 

 yielded by the janthina passes through the same changes of light and shade 

 as the vegetable colors do. With alkalies, it becomes blue ; Avith acids, red. 



Some writers include Aphjsia dcpulans and Scalaria dathrtis among the 

 purple sea-snails, but this is doubtful. It is true that the aplysia sometimes 

 voluntarily, ahvays when alarmed, does emit a beautiful purple fluid, and, in the 

 latter case, in such quantities as to color the water for several yards around- 

 Probably the purple fluid, in the case of the shell-fish, is analogous to the 

 ink of the cuttlefish, the concealing and protecting provision of the otherwise 

 defenceless creature. The fluid is colored at the moment of its ejection, but 

 the tint is of slight duration. The fluid of the Scalaria rlathrus is still more 

 evanescent — time and exposure to light discharging it entirely. Of the Plan- 

 orhis Cornells Wallis says : " If you put salt, ginger, or pepper into its mouth 

 it yields a purple fluid, but the color is so evanescent that we know of no 

 mordant that can fix it." 



At present we arc acquainted with a great number of purple-yielding shell- 

 fish, but we cannot identify any of them Avith the purple sea-snails of the an- 

 cients, the descriptions left us by the old writers being too general and vague. 



In our own time Bancroft has industriously experimented with the dyeing 

 fluid of purple sea-snails, and he asserts that they yield a fluid which surpasses 

 everything else in animal nature, alike for the brilliancy and the permanency 

 of its purple, and for the facility and simplicity of its use. Within the fish, or 

 wdien separated from it, the fluid has a creamy appearance, or, as Reaumur 

 phrases it, resembles a well-developed pus. The textures to Avhich it is ap- 

 plied become first of a light, then of a darker green, next blue, and acquire 

 finally a rich deep purple tint, inclining to crimson. According to Bancroft, the 

 gradual prismatic changes of the colors are as beautiful as they are remarkable. 

 Even the most powerful chemical agencies, whether mineral acids or the most 

 corrosive alkali, can only subject this purple to one change — wash the fabric in 



