DYES AND TANNING MATERIALS. 121 



was exhibited in the Natal Court of the Colonial and Indian 

 Exhibition. Mr. T. Christy, in his New Commercial Plants 

 and Drugs, No. 10, published in 1887, says : " Mr. W. N. 

 Evans, who tested the root, states that it contains 25*37 per 

 cent, of tannin, and that, if it were to work up in a similar 

 manner to Mimosa bark, the best samples might be worth 

 from 14 to 1 5 per ton. With regard to its practical 

 value as a tanning material for leather, from the incomplete 

 trials that were made with the small quantity received, it 

 was found to give too red a colour; but I should not like to 

 speak positively upon this point, as in treating a few cwts. 

 of the roots at a time it might be found that this detriment 

 could be overcome." 



Phyllocladus trichomanoides. A very large coniferous 

 tree of New Zealand, where it is known as TANEKAHA. 

 The bark, which is of an orange-yellow colour, has of late 

 years come largely into use in this country for dyeing kid 

 or dogskin gloves the fashionable golden orange. 



Under the name of CANAIGRE a tanning material has 

 been known in America for the last ten years or more, and 

 accounts of it have appeared from time to time in this 

 country. In the Leather Trades Circular for August 8, 

 1885, under the head of "New Tanning Agents," the 

 following occurred : " An Arizona paper states that a new 

 tanning agent, likely to be of great value, has been dis- 

 covered, one which also has the property of adding weight 

 to the leather. The plant is an annual, and grows upon 

 desert and dry upland soil. It is known by the Mexicans 

 and Indians as GOUAGRA. . . . Practical use demonstrated 

 that the tanning properties of this root were about three 

 times as great as the common oak bark, and that in all 

 essentials it was superior to the bark in the manufacture of 

 leather." The roots, which are fleshy, are from three to six 

 inches long, and one and a half to three inches broad, of a 

 somewhat oval shape, and covered with a dark brown skin. 



