253 



PAPER HANGINGS. 



PAPER MANUFACTURE AND TRADE. 



254 



These satin papers sometimes receive an additional beauty, by being 

 passed between two slightly heated rollers, one of which has an 

 engraved pattern in imitation of watered and figured silk, <fcc. : this 

 pattern is thus imparted to the paper. Flock papers are those in which 

 a portion of the pattern somewhat resembles woollen cloth. We have 

 already spoken of these, as originally produced; but in the present 

 mode of manufacture, when the proper ground-colour has been applied, 

 the device is printed, not with a coloured pigment, but with japan 

 gold-size ; and on this gold-size is sprinkled the flock, consisting of 

 fragments of woollen cloth cut into a sort of down and dyed. The 

 flock adheres to the gold size and can easily be brushed off the other 

 parts. Sometimes flocks of two or three colours are employed ; these 

 are laid on at separate times. The French have acquired much skill 

 in the preparation of these flock papers : some of their tmbussed and 

 shaded flocks are very beautiful. Striped papers are sometimes pro- 

 duced in a singular manner. The colour (rather more liquid than in 

 other cases) is contained in a trough having parallel slits in the bottom. 

 The paper is made to pass quickly under the bottom of the trough, by 

 means of a revolving cylinder, and thus obtains a deposit of colour in 

 parallel lines, through the slits in the bottom of the trough. By a 

 modification of this method is produced what is termed a b'.ciuled 

 ground. A trough, containing many distinct cells, is filled with 

 various tints of any given colour, one tint to each cell. A long narrow 

 brush being dipped into all these cells, takes up a portion of each tint, 

 which it applies to a roller ; from the roller the pigment is transferred to 

 a revolving brush, and from the brush to the paper. Thus is produced 

 a blended or shaded ground, which afterwards receives any desired 

 pattern. Bronze or imitation gold-powder is frequently applied to 

 papers. A device being printed in japan gold-size, the powder is 

 lightly rubbed over the paper, and adheres to the gold-size. The 

 remainder of the pattern is commonly printed in colours. In some 

 wall-papers, leaf-gold, silver, or copper is applied to a portion of the 

 pattern : this is a slow and expensive process. Other kinds, again, in 

 order to bear washing or cleaning, are printed with colours mixed with 

 oil or varnish instead of size. A modern kind called out paper is pro- 

 duced in a remarkable way ; the grain is printed from a piece of real 

 oak, and is thus more true to nature than any block engraved by hand ; 

 by shaving off a few fibres, a new pattern of grain can be developed at 

 pleasure. Among various novelties in the manufacture, one relate* to 

 the printing of the pattern in a direction trantrerit to the direction of 

 the paper, and pasting the paper horizontally on the wall ; the inteu- 

 eems to be, to diversify the effect, by removing a sameness 

 resulting from the usual plan. 



A matter of a remarkable and somewhat important nature has lately 

 come under public notice, in connection with the use of arsenic in the 

 colouring of paper-hanging*. Certain tints of green are produced, 

 more permanent than other kinds available to paper-stainers ; and 

 these permanent greens contain arsenic. When a committee of the 

 House of Lords was collecting evidence on the " Sale of Poisons " 

 bill, in 1*57, Dr. A. S. Taylor brought forward this subject He 

 stated that arsenic is more largely used for these greens than in any 

 other English manufacture ; and that workmen, as well as the occu- 

 pants of houses, Buffered thereby. Constriction of the throat, nausea, 

 head ache, loss of appetite, Ac. result. Instances bad come under hU 

 notice, as a physician, tending to prove that rooms, hung with paper 

 d with arsenic greens, are very prejudicial to health. Another 

 physician, Dr. Hinds, detected a minute trace of arsenic in loaves of 

 bread which had been placed on the shelves of a newly-papered shop, 

 the paper being brilliant with arsenic-green. A working paper-banger 

 inf. rmed Dr. Taylor that he always suffered from inflamed eyes and 

 nose, sickness, and giddiness, on the days when he wag engaged upon 

 green papers. The Prussian government, attending to the cautions of 

 ms and chemists, forbid the use of arsenic in any colours, 

 whether distemper, or oil, for indoor work. 



With regard to the jxUKrm of paper-hangings, we may remark, that 

 tliu attention which has lately been given to the promotion of the arts 

 of design will probably lead to much improvement in the devices for 

 paper-hangings, as well as for other ornamental productions. Hr. Owen 

 Jones and other artist* of distinguished ability, have supplied manu- 

 facturers with designs of a very superior character; but the gnat 

 >f English designs are utterly inappropriate, and many, even 

 when the paper hangings are of an expensive kind, in extreme bad 

 taste. 



Sir Robert Peel made fiscal changes which greatly improved the 

 hanging manufacture. There used to be an import duty of It. 

 per square yard on foreign paper-hangings ; this wag nearly prohibitory, 

 and t: mufacturers had not the stimulus of foreign com- 



petition ; when the duty, however, was reduced to \\d., elegant French 

 papers came in, and taught a lesson. A further improvement was made 

 by lessening the duty on paper itself from 3rf. to 14^. per lb., and by 

 wholly repealing the extra duty of l\d. per square yard on paper 

 hangings. Whatever may be said as to taste in line art, it is certain 

 that cleanliness and comfort have been promoted by then reforms ; 

 seeing tliat wall-papers can now be sold at so very low a price as to come 

 within the reach of nearly all classes. At present, nothing beyond the 

 japer-duty of 1 \d. per lb. (plus 5 per cent.) presses on the trade ; yet it 

 has been recently shown that this l^d. is, in many cases, more than as 

 much as the paper-stainer receives for all his expenses, labour, 



machinery, anxiety, risk, and profit of every kind. He buys a ream of 

 self-coloured or ground-colovired paper, weighing 300 lb., and con- 

 taining 480 pieces of 12 yards each ; he gives for it 51. 15s., of which 

 II. Ills. id. is for excise duty. He prints and sells it wholesale for 

 6/. 17s. 6rf., or 3J(/. per piece ; and this price is made up of Ijrf. for 

 paper, Id. for duty, and jrf. for colours, tools, labour, machinery, rent, 

 skill, risk, and profit. 



PAPER MANUFACTURE AND TRADE. In early times the 

 materials used for writing upon were chiefly such as only required 

 some little mechanical fashioning to fit them for that purpose. 

 Characters were engraved on flat stones made smooth, or were im- 

 pressed in clay, which was afterwards dried and hardened by sun or 

 fire, as in the case of the Babylonian bricks. Thin boards of wood 

 covered with wax or some similar composition, and plates of ivory 

 and of metal, have often been used. A more convenient material was 

 afforded by the leaves of some species of trees. The skins and intes- 

 tines of animals have also been made ftt for writing upon ; but wherever 

 the Egyptian papyrus was introduced, all these things fell into disuse, 

 except parchment, which is still preferred for certain purposes. 

 [PAIICHMENT ; PAPYRUS.] 



Paper Manufacture, The art of making paper from fibrous matter 

 reduced to a pulp in water appears to have been first discovered by the 

 Chinese about the year Wa A.D. In the time of Confucius they wrote 

 with a style, or bodkin, on the inner bark of the bamboo. The 

 Chinese paper has been supposed to be made of silk ; but this is a mis- 

 take. Silk by itself cannot be reduced to a pulp suitable for making 

 paper. Refuse silk is indeed occasionally used with other things ; but 

 the greatest part of the Chinese paper is made from the inner bark of 

 the bamboo and some other trees. The Chinese also make paper 

 from cotton and linen rags ; and a coarse yellow sort for wrappers 

 is made from rice-straw. Only the second skin of the bark of the 

 bamboo is used, which is beaten into a pulp with water. The Chinese 

 can 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. It is formed of fine threads of 

 bamboo, as ours are of wire. To prevent the ink from running, the 

 sheets are dipped into a solution of alum, which, as their ink is thicker 

 than ours, is generally sufficient for the purpose, but sometimes fish- 

 glue is mixed with the solution of alum. (Du Halde's ' China,' vol. ii., 

 p. 415 ; Davis's ' Chinese,' chap, xvii ) 



The Arabians, in the 7th century, appear either to have discovered, 

 or to have learned from the Chinese, the art of making paper from 

 cottoii. They seem to have carried the art to Spain, and to have there 

 made paper from linen and hemp as well as from cotton. (' Journal 

 of Education,' No. 10.) 



So far as concerns our own country, a manufacturer named Tate had 

 a paper mill at Hertford early in the 16th century; and another mill 

 wa established in 1588 at Dartford in Kent, by John Spelmau, who 

 was knighted by queen Elizabeth. Previously to this, and for some 

 time afterwards, our priucip.il supplies were from France and Holland. 

 The making of paper in Knghiul had made little progress even so late as 

 1 662. Fuller lias the following remarks respecting the paper of his time : 

 " 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, 

 sucking up the ink with the sponginess thereof." He complains that 

 the making of pai>er was not sufficiently encouraged, " considering the 

 vast sums of money expended in our land for paper out of Italy, France, 

 an 1 (iennany, which might be lessened were it made in our nation." 

 Thomas WaUon, a stationer, by the introduction of foreign improve- 

 ments in 1713, gave a great impulse to the manufacture of paper. 

 Still, notwithstanding the great increase of demand and application of 

 capital, it was much retarded by the heavy duty, of which we shall 

 have to speak presently. So late as the middle of the last century, 

 only very common paper, principally for wrapping, was made in Great 

 Britain. It was not until 1 770 that the celebrated \V~hatman introduced 

 fine-paper making at his mill at Maidstone. 



In the making of paper, any fibrous vegetable substance may be used : 

 such as the inner bark of trees, the stalks of the nettle, the tendrils of 

 the vine, the bine of the hop, wheat straw, flax straw, &c. Nothing 

 however has yet been found to answer so well as linen, hempen, or 

 cotton rags. The sweepings of the cotton-mills are also much used. 

 Woollen cloth is not fit for the purpose, because it cannot be beaten 

 into a suitable pulp, and also because it gives a hairy texture to the 

 surface. Linen rags are the best of all for the purpose. The rags, 

 however, of our own country do not constitute a fourth part of the 

 quantity which we use in making paper. Italy and Germany furnish 

 the principal supplies. They are imported in bags of about 4 cwts., 

 each bag being marked in such a manner as to indicate the quality of 

 the rags which it contains. 



In every paper-mill the first business is to sort the rags and cut 

 them into small pieces. This is done by women, each of whom is 

 provided with a large knife to cut the rags. Threads and seams are 

 carefully put by themselves : if ground with the cloth, they would 

 form s]>eckB in the paper. The rags, when cut, are thrown in to five 

 or six different compartments of a large chest, according to their 

 qualities. Only the finest linen rags are used for the best writing- 

 paper, but cotton as well as linen rags are now 



