Packing and Despatching. 63 



and much loss of indigo is thus sustained, to say 

 nothing of the expenditure of good cloth burst and 

 spoilt. 



The cakes are cut in machines specially made for 

 the purpose. The slabs of indigo are put in some 

 machines upright, in some flat, and cut by hand with 

 a brass wire. Each cake is then carefully stamped 

 with the name of the factory and the number of 

 the boiling, to check off afterwards the quality 

 and date of the colour. They are then taken into 

 the godown or drying house, and placed on mat 

 or bamboo trellis-work on shelves in tiers, one above 

 another ; each day's manufacture having its ticket 

 attached to the tier on which its cakes lay, so that 

 by reading the number and remarks on the wooden 

 ticket any specimen or cake of any date can in 

 a moment be at once got down. When the cakes 

 are thoroughly dry they are carefully taken down 

 and cleaned with soft brushes or, now-a-days, by a 

 machine which has been invented for the purpose by 

 Messrs. Begg & Co., of Calcutta, and they are then 

 packed. 



PACKING AND DESPATCHING. 



The packing is done with the utmost care and 

 precision, in order to avoid broken cakes and pieces. 

 After all the cakes have been taken down from the 

 shelves and brushed and cleaned, they are packed 



