SOUTHERN HORIZONS 



flourishing business back in 1275 when the Venetian 

 adventurer, Marco Polo, was hobnobbing with the 

 Celestial Emperor. It was already an old Chinese cus- 

 tom, he tells us, to coat the seams of their junks with a 

 mixture of lime and chopped hemp kneaded together 

 with tung oil. The origins of the tung trade simply 

 fade out into misty obscurity somewhere about the 

 year 3000 B.C. 



Tung oil is the neat trick by which the Chinese make 

 their paper umbrellas and the paper walls of their 

 houses tough and waterproof. It is the old, well-kept 

 secret of those marvelous antique Chinese lacquers. 

 Nobody has ever duplicated their depth, rich colors, or 

 their ability to withstand heat and moisture. We keep 

 bowls finished with these Chinese lacquers in our art 

 museums; in the homes of wealthy Chinese they serve 

 boiled rice in them. But we have put tung oil to work 

 in ways the Chinese never imagined. We use it, for 

 example, in the finest grades of linoleum and oilcloth; 

 in the brake bands of our cars; in quick-drying printing 

 inks; in safer coverings that insulate electric wires. 



The identical properties that made it the priceless 

 ingredient of the Chinese lacquers have won it the 

 reputation of being the queen of all drying oils. That 

 means that tung oil dries very quickly into the smooth- 

 est, toughest, most water-resistant film, the ideal oil 

 for paints and varnish. So if you must have an honest- 

 Injun, waterproof spar varnish, the kind that finishes a 



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