$21 TRAVELS IK UPPER 



mediately carr'*.d to the Nile, where it is washed 

 and beaten. It is afterwards spread out, in order 

 to dry. 



When the skeins are pretty dry, they are wash- 

 ed anew in the whey which flows from cheeses, 

 in Arabic called mesch. This is a sort of dressing 

 which gives quality to the cloth ; and when the 

 Egyptians handle a cloth not very stout, they say 

 it has no mesch. 



To bleach two hundred pounds of thread it 

 commonly requires one hundred pounds of natron, 

 and from sixty to eighty pounds of lime ; observ- 

 ing, however, that the j«/ta;/ -natron, that is to say, 

 that which is the purest, being more powerful than 

 the common, must be used in a smaller quantity. 

 Without this precaution, the thread or the cloth 

 would run the hazard of being burnt. 



So expeditious a method of bleaching cloth and 

 thread, would merit being attempted in France. It 

 is said that it was formerly adopted at Rouen, but 

 that it had been laid aside because it burnt the 

 cloths*. It is possible that they did not make the 

 proper preparations, nor observe the same process 

 as the Egyptians, for it is very certain that neither 

 their threads nor cloths were burnt. The com- 



* Voyage de la Boullaye le Gouz, Paris, 1657, page 383. 



merce 



