1825.] of Claude-Louis Bertholkt. 83 



treating the cloth with an alkahne ley. Harassed by this 

 impediment, which threatened to take away all permanent bene- 

 fit from his discovery, he began, however, to conceive that there 

 is a strong analogy between the action of his chlorine upon the 

 cloth, and that of the ordinary process of bleaching, by subjec- 

 tion to hght, air, and the moisture of a meadow exposure. He 

 next considered that as the effect of this latter process is not a 

 bleaching of the cloth, but merely such a loosening of the 

 colouring matters as facilitates their final disengagement by 

 some subsequent process, the same result might follow a similar 

 aid given to the bleaching by chlorine. He accordingly con- 

 joined the action of an alkaline ley with the immersion in chlo- 

 rine, and by subjecting the cloth to these two processes for 

 several times in alternate succession, he was happy enough to 

 succeed in rendering it permanently white. The bleaching was 

 rendered still more perfect by adding the customary finish of the 

 process, a steeping in dilute sulphuric acid, or in very sour 

 buttermilk, 



M, BerthoUet had brought his new process to this stage of 

 perfection, when he communicated his success to his friend Mr. 

 Watt, the illustrious improver of the steam engine, who hap- 

 pened to be then in Paris. This gentleman, whose whole life 

 was devoted to the advancement of the arts, saw at a glance the 

 advantages that must result to his country by transferring this 

 process from the laboratory of the chemist to the extensive work 

 of the bleacher ; and soon after his return to England, he wrote 

 to M. BerthoUet, informing him that his father-in-law, Mr. 

 Gregor, proprietor of an extensive bleach field, near Glasgow, 

 had bleached 500 pieces of cloth upon the French system. And 

 it is surely well to mention that our countryman, besides the 

 honour of being the first to carry into England so important a 

 saving of time and expense, in one of the most extensive of the 

 useful arts, had also the merit of inventing and introducing 

 several important modifications of the apparatus required in tlie 

 operation. 



Unhappily for France, she laboured at that time under a system 

 of financial disorder accompanied by heavy taxation, of which 

 that of the gabelle, or tax on salt, was one of the most unequal 

 and of the most severe. And as all the chlorine was extracted 

 from this article, she was unable at once to avail herself of the 

 full benefits which immediately accrued to Britain from this 

 discovery. Besides, the arts had then made comparatively 

 small progress with her; and ignorance, ever hostile to improve- 

 ment as an iunovaf ion, hindered for some time the general diffu- 

 sion of the new process. Us inherent superiority was, however, 

 too manifest to be slighted by prejudice, and too great to be 

 destroyed by the more formidable obstacle of taxation. It was 

 soon introduced and practised to a large extent by many intelli 



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