PAPIER MA"CHE. 



PAPYRUS. 



262 





to learn this manufacture from Lefevre. On returning to his own 

 country, he was so successful in his exertions that his pajwr snuff- 

 boxes were called, after him, " Martins." So much money went from 

 Prussia to France in purchase of papier-mache 1 articles, that Frederic II., 

 in 17 '15, established a manufactory at Berlin, which soon became very 

 successful. Brunswick, Nurnberg, Vienna, and other German towns, 

 by degrees commenced the manufacture, and it is now carried on to a 

 considerable extent. 



Two modes are adopted of making articles of this kind : 1, By 

 glueing or pastin ? different thicknesses of paper together ; 2, By mixing 

 the substance of the paper into a pulp and pressing it into moulds. 

 The first mode is adopted principally for those articles, such as trays, 

 &c., in which a tolerably plain and 'flat surface is to be produced 

 Common millboard, such as forms the covers of books, may convey 

 gome idea of this sort of manufacture. Sheets of strong paper are 

 glued together, and then so powerfully pressed that the different 

 strata of paper become as one. Slight curvatures may be given to 

 such pasteboard when damp, by the use of presses and moulds. Some 

 of the snuffboxes are made by glueing pieces of paper, cut to the sizes 

 of the top, bottom, and sides, one on another, round a frame or mould, 

 which is afterwards removed. Articles made of pasteboard have often 

 a fine black polish impirted to them in the following manner : After 

 being coated with a mixture of size and lampblack, they receive a 

 coating of a peculiar varnish. Turpentine is boiled down till it 

 becomes black, and three times as much amber in fine powder is 

 sprinkled into it, with the addition of a little spirit or oil of tur- 

 pentine. When the amber is melted, some sarcocolla and some more 

 spirit of turpentine are added, and the whole is well stirred. After 

 being strained, this varnish is mixed with ivory-black, and applied in 

 a hot room on the papier-mache* articles, which are then placed in a 

 heated oven. Two or three coatings of the black varnish will produce 

 a durable and glossy surface impervious to water. Some of the articles 

 now made in this way have their surfaces inlaid with mother-of-pearl ; 

 the shell is fastened down to the surface as a veneer, an immense body 

 of varnish is laid on, and by rubbing the superfluous varnish from the 

 pearl, the whole is brought to one common level, presenting a brilliant 

 if not always tasteful effect. The better kin 1 of tea-trays are shape"W 

 in or rather on iron moulds, the top of the mould giving the shape of 

 the tray. The paper employed is a grayish, thick, granulated kind, 

 made expressly for the purpose. The mould and paper are taken to a 

 heated stove room to dry, after three thicknesses have been applied ; 

 and this removal is repeated from ten to forty times, for the trays are 

 made of thicknesses of paper varying from thirty to a hundred and 

 twenty. Thu surface of the mould is greased in the first instance, to 

 entire the easy removal of the papier-mache' when of the proper thick 

 ness. A patent was taken out a few yean ago for making papier-mache' 

 for carriages, and considerable skill has been shown in the 

 manufacture ; but such panels are not much used in England, owing 

 in part to the operation of the piper duty. 



The second kind of papier-macho' is, however, the more extensively 

 made. It comprise* that which is pressed into moulds in the state of 

 a pulp. This pulp U generally made of cuttings of coarse paper boiled 

 in water, and beaten in a mortar till they assume the consistence of a 

 paste, which U boiled in a solution of gum-arabic or of size to give it 

 tenacity. The moulds are carved in the usual way, and the pulp 

 poured into them, a counter-mould being employed to make the cast 

 nothing more than a crust or shell, as in plaster casts. In some manu- 

 factories, instead of using cuttings of made paper, the pulp employed 

 by the paper-maker is, after some further treatment, poured into the 

 moulds to produce papier macho" ornament*. The use of ornaments 

 made in the way just described is rapidly increasing. The carved and 

 composition ornaments employed to decorate picture- and looking- 

 glass frames are in some case* superseded by those of papier-mache' ; 

 but it is in the decoration of ceilings and walls of rooms and the 

 interiors of public buildings that papier-machd U found most valuable. 

 Plaster and composition ornaments are very ponderous ; carved orna- 

 ments are costly ; but those of paper are light and of moderate price. 

 In many of our theatres, in the House of Lords, in the Pantheon 

 Bazaar, in the saloons of some of the splendid steam-boats recently 

 built, and in numerous other instances where internal decorations are 

 required, papier-mache" ornaments have been largely employed. Maps 

 in relief are also occasionally made of (lapier-michiS. 



A remarkable instance of the employment of papier-machd is men- 

 tioned in Ersch and Griiber's ' Allgemeine Encyclopedic.' Near Bergen 

 in Norway a church has been built capable of holding nearly a thou-aud 

 persons. This building is octagonal without, but perfectly circular 

 within. The interior of the walls, as well as the exterior of the 

 Corinthian columns, is covered with papier-macho'. The roof, the 

 ceiling, the statues within the church, and the basso-rilievu on the 

 outside of the walk, are also made of this substance. The papier- 

 mache was made water-proof, and nearly lire-proof, by an application 

 of vitriol-water and lime slaked 1 with whey and white of egg. 



An important modification of papier macho u that which is known 

 by the name of carton, picrn, or stone cardboard. This substance has 

 been employed for half a century in France, but its use in England has 

 been much more recent. It U a mixture of paper pulp, whiting, ami 

 glue. The mixture is pressed into moulds, then backed with paper, 

 and removed to a drying-room to harden. The substance, when dr , 



is light, strong, and facile of application as an architectural ornament. 

 It is now much used in obtaining casts of statuettes, busts, dead 

 game, friezes, pilasters, foliage, &c. Messrs. Jackson and Graham have 

 used this material very largely in the Army and Navy Club-house and 

 other modern buildings. 



Messrs. Bielefeld, among other inventions relating to papier-m;\che", 

 have introduced a mode of grinding fibrous and other materials into a 

 consistence like that of putty; this is put into frames of a proper depth, 

 rolled and compressed, heated and oiled, and finished by painting or 

 varnishing. One among various composidons proposed is the follow- 

 ing : 32 Ibs. flour, 9 Ibs. alum, and 1 Ib. copper are mixed with 80 Ibs. 

 water ; to these are added 15 Ibs. resin, 1 Ib. litharge, and 10 Ibs. boiled 

 linseed oil ; the whole is finally ground up with 60 Ibs. rag-dust or 

 paper-makers' half-stuff. 



PAPIST, an appellation derived from papa, " the pope," aud which 

 denotes a follower of the Roman Catholic church. That church calls 

 itself catholic, which means " universal ; ' but as other Christian 

 churches also style themselves " catholic," a distinction seems required 

 to avoid confusion. The appellation Roman Catholic is generally used 

 all over Europe to denote a follower of the church of Rome, in con- 

 tradistinction to the followers of other Christian communions ; but in 

 Great Britain the words Papist and Romanist have been long in 

 common use. 



1'AI'VKIN. A name given to a modification of cellulose produced 

 by immersing blotting-paper in strong sulphuric acid, then washing 

 with water, and finally immersing for a few seconds in water containing 

 a trace of ammonia. The paper thus acquires physical properties 

 resembling parchment. [PARCHMENT, VEGETABLE.] 



PAPYRUS. The name of a plant and the material made from it, 

 especially that for writing used by the nations of antiquity. One of 

 it names in the ancient Egyptian was P-apu (Select Papyri, PI. xviii., 

 1. 9.), which passed into Greek and Latin under the form papyrus ; by 

 the Hebrews it was called <,ome, which resembks the hieroglyphic 

 gomt, and Coptic gumi, a " book," or " volume." (Lepsius, Todt., Ixxii. 

 162.9.) The Greeks also called it By bios (Herod, ii. 92.), or deltas, 

 from the Delta, where it principally grew, and gave books this name 

 (Winckelmann, ii. 96, 225, Dread.). The term biblion, or bible, means 

 in fact, a bix>k or roll of. papyrus. The plant itself, the paper rush, 

 or Cy/*erut unti/jiwrum, called herd by the modern Egyptians, dis- 

 tinguished by its tall prismatic, or triangular aud tapering stem, 

 growing to the height of about 10 fe-.-t, surmounted by a downy 

 dower, appears to have been abundant in Egypt at the early period of 

 the 4th dynasty. On monuments of the reign of Chephren, and 

 Cheops, men are represented bearing bundles of this plant (Lepaius, 

 Denkm , ii. 9-1 1), which they have gathered, or forming it into the 

 light boats by wh.ch they crossed the marshes or the Nile (Lepsius, 

 Ucukm., ii. 12). The principal site of its cultivation was the alluvial 

 ponds Mikk ( Lepsius, Denkm., ii. 7 4). where it is represented reaching the 

 height of 10 feet in the Delta (Lepsius, Denkm., ii. 106 a). As early as 

 the ;'<tli dynasty, it appears in the hieroglyphics, either for the pre- 

 paration of a colour for the eyes (Lepsius, ii. 22), or as designating the 

 land of northern Egypt or the Delta, where 'it particularly grew (Ibid, 

 ii. 47) ; but as the plant has gradually disappeared from Egypt, some 

 naturalists have supposed that it was uot indigenous, but introduced 

 from the Niger or Euphrates, where it is still found native, and that 

 it has become extinct for want of necessary culture. It has, however, 

 been seen as late as the H'th century on the borders of the lake 

 Menzaleh, the Phtetnitic Uylarus, in Upper Egypt and in Abyssinia. 

 Some think indeed, that the term papyrus comprehended two or three 

 tilth-rent kinds of reeds, such as the Cyperiu dives, which is still 

 cultivated in Egypt, and that the disappearance of the Cyperiu papyrut 

 is owing to the monopoly of the Roman contractors or publicani, who 

 restricted its culture to a few localities. (Strabo. xvii. 550 c.) 

 According to Pliny, it grew ten feet above, and two in the water, besides 

 striking deep roots into the Nilotic mud, in the pools or marshes of the 

 Sebynuitic and Saitic nomes. 



The papyrus was one of those plants which the ancients con- 

 verted to a multitude of uses. Its elegant aud light flowers were 

 woven into crowns, aud neither the Spartan Ageailaus nor the Mithra- 

 iates VI., of the line of Pontus, disdained to use it for that purpose, 

 its pith or pulp was boiled ami eaten, and considered the primitive 

 food of Egypt, the root, on the contrary, was dried and used for fuel, 

 the bark was manufactured into matting, sails, and ropes, bedding, aud 

 slothes. The priest used it only for sandals ; and sandals of it remain 

 to the present day in the collections of the British Museum. (Pliny, 

 N. H. xiii. 11, 22; Strabo, xvii. 799. E). Boxes were also made of its 

 stems, trimmed and tied at the ends aud middle ; aud iu an ark or box 

 <>f papyrui, the youthful Moses was placed amongst the standing pools 

 of papyri. At the time of Homer, it was used by the Greeks for 

 rigging (Udys. xxi. 31)1), and Antigonus used for the cables of his 

 fleet, papyrus grown in Syria. The ancient Greek name for the mate- 

 rial was tMtilvt, but it was not applied by prose writers to books 

 (Lucan, iii. 222). 



The invention of papyrus for boats was attributed to Isis, who 

 searched fur her husband Osiris in a bark of this material, which was 

 said to be especially shunned by crocodiles, probably the reason why 

 Moses was exposed in an ark of the same material by his mother. 

 These boats re mentioned by Isaiah, Theouhrastus, and Pliny. But 



