DYES AND TANNING MATERIALS. 157 



Among substitutes for Gutta Percha, the most 

 important is BALATA (Mimusops globosa^ Gaertn.), 

 introduced from British Guiana in 1859.* Another 

 likely to prove valuable is PAUCONTEE (Bassia ellip- 

 tica, Dalz.), from the West Coast of India,t whilst 

 MUDAR (Calotropis gigantea, R. Br.), Euphorbia Catti- 

 mandoo, Elliott, and other species of the same genus, 

 from the same country, will no doubt become 

 important. 



PART V. DYES AND TANNING 

 MATERIALS. 



IN no class of vegetable products has chemistry so 

 largely superseded the compounds prepared by 

 Nature, as it has in the case of those used in dyeing 

 and tanning. The invention of the great and ever- 

 lengthening series of aniline colours, and the prepara- 

 tion, in 1869, of Alizarine, the colouring-matter of 

 Madder, by synthesis, and now, again, the introduction 

 of the chrome-process in tanning, have had a most 

 striking, and, in some respects, not altogether a satis- 

 factory effect. Dr. George Watt, for instance, saysj 

 that ' these cheap colours have not only depraved the 

 tastes of the people, but have demoralized their 

 indigenous industries ;' much less Safflower, Lac. 

 Indigo and Cochineal being exported now than ten 

 years ago, whilst even Manjit, Saffron, and Myro- 



* G. S. Jenman, ' Timehri,' iv, p. 219. 

 f Hugh Cleghorn, ' Paucontee,' Madras, 1858, 410. 

 t ' Catalogue of Indian Exhibits : Colonial and Indian Exhi- 

 bition,' p. 148. 



