44J2 • [Assembly 



indigo in water, with pi:oper vegetable matters, which will im- 

 mediately ferment ; while this is going on the indigo is deprived 

 of its oxygen, and may be dissolved with quick lime. This prep- 

 aration is used for the purpose of dyeing silk and wool. 



Indigo is divided into several sorts, called first, second, third, 

 fourth and fifth ; the 2d, 4th and 5th sorts, are annual plants, 

 and must be sown in a hot-bed early in the spring, transplanted 

 into pots when two inches high, and then plunged into a hot-bed 

 of tanners' bark. The second and fourth sorts are promiscuously 

 used to make the indigo. The second is the sort cultivated in 

 America, this is the same cultivated by the French, and called 

 in commerce Guatimala Indigo. A species similar to the 3d 

 sort of India grows well in South Carolina, and was much es- 

 teemed some years since, for the beauty of the commodity it 

 produced. 



The plants are slender and thinly garnished with foliage, con- 

 sequently they furnish but a small quantity of indigo. The pro- 

 cess of making indigo is simple. The vats intended to receive 

 the plant are three in number ; one placed above the other in 

 form of a cascade, so that the second which is lower than the 

 bottom of the first, may receive the liquor contained in the first, 

 when the holes in the bottom are unstopped, that the third may 

 in its return receive what is in the second. The first is called the 

 steeper or rot ; the second is called the battery, and should be 

 half as large as the first. The third which is still smaller is 

 called the deviling or settler. 



In the first, tlie plant is laid to steep, and ferment, when it 

 soon presents the appearance of rotten manure ; immediately 

 after the salts and substance of the leaf and rind are sufiiciently 

 diffused in the water by the fermentation, which has been ex- 

 cited by the heat and ripeness of the plant, it is drawn into the 

 second vat, where it is agitated, and shaken and beaten, until 

 the salts of the plant, with which the water is loaded is coagula- 

 ted, and throughly united with it. It is then allowed to run in- 

 to the third, where the particles composing the dye are formed^ 

 These are collected, placed in small bags, and then into boxes 

 for commercial purposes. 



