PAPER INDUSTRY. 399 



Manufacture of Bark Paper. 



Although the materials which are used in the paper industry of 

 Japan, and the varieties of paper made from them, are so different, 

 the process is and has been essentially always the same, and the 

 product hand-made or tub paper throughout. I have already 

 observed that in modern times the manufacture of machine paper 

 has been introduced also ; this finds its use in newspaper printing, 

 and has the advantage of being capable of receiving impression 

 on both sides. 



Before this, however, the manufacture of paper rested entirely 

 on manual labour. Any shortening or lightening of the process 

 by water power or machinery was unknown, so that one could 

 speak neither of paper mills , nor paper factories.^ Paper-making 

 was and is still (with the exception of a few modern factories 

 mentioned above), a domestic industry in the true sense of the 

 word, usually consisting of but one or two scoop vats in a house ; 

 but found in hundreds of places. Paper-making is often performed 

 by simple peasants, who let it rest for months when, in summer, 

 the work in the fields claims all their labour. 



Before the fibre, which has been freed from the epidermis and 

 green parts of the bark, is further treated, the edges of knot-holes and 

 other defective places are cut out. It is then either laid for several 

 days in running water, or at once, as is usually the case, boiled 

 in an iron kettle with lye from a half-hour to three hours, till it is 

 quite soft and can be crushed with the fingers. The lye is generally 

 made from ashes, but sometimes from slaked lime. In Itchikawa 

 (province of Koshiu) was used, in 1874, a lye on Matsu-mata bast, 

 prepared in a pail or tub by pouring hot water on a mixture of 2 To 

 4 Sho of wood ashes (Maki-hai) and 6 Sho of buckwheat straw ashes 

 (Soba-hai). The soft, boiled bast pulp was washed in a tub with 

 fresh water till, after four or five renewals, the water was perfectly 

 clear. The process of preparing Broussonetia bast in Makidani- 

 mura (province of Mino) was similar, except that here flowing 

 water was used for washing. In Tosa and lyo also, and at Nibu in 

 the province of Yamato, where the interesting Yoshino-gami is 

 prepared, and in many other places, I noticed the same operations. 



With Gampi bast, 10 per cent, of burned lime (Ishi-bai) is added 

 to the water, and I have seen lime used in Suruga in preparing 

 Mitsu-mata also. The reddish brown colour which the bast acquires 

 in this lime bath disappears after washing and a longer submersion 

 in running water. 



The bast material thus prepared in one way or the other, may be 



1 When the paper industry was established with us in Germany, in the 13th 

 century, there were no stamp mills, which were introduced later from Italy. 

 The raw miterial (rags) was boiled, beaten, and stamped as in Japan, till it had 

 become a jelly-like pulp ready for the vats. 



