41 



That is an incontrovertible fact, and one need not stop to 

 cite instances to prove it. 



Old specimens of woven fabrics of silk may be seen in 

 the South Kensington Museum, whose colours have stood, 

 but little impaired, for more centuries than the results of 

 modern dyes would stand months of exposure to light. 



It is also as true that the dyes from aniline, napthalymine, 

 and other kindred derivatives are fugitive, and it is exceed- 

 ingly improbable that science will ever make them proof 

 against that most searching and crucical of all tests — light. 



The natural hues of colour of the older modes of dyeing 

 and their combinations are also of more refined and 

 therefore more artistic tones than the modern chemical 

 dyes give ; hence they are preferred by those whose 

 tastes and insight are more artistic than those of the 

 general public, which are more or less unrefined, and there- 

 fore more or less meretricious and gaudy. 



But a remarkable change has gradually come over the 

 preference for colour throughout Europe within the last 20 

 years, or since the days when the magenta colour was 

 adored. Less gaudy colours are now preferred in all 

 decorative departments, and the truer principles of colour 

 combinations are more understood and liked. There can 

 be no doubt this change has been brought about, in painting 

 for instance, by modern pre-Raphael thought and work. 



So much has this influence been felt, consciously and 

 unconsciously, that the colour products for the million, 

 recently and even now occasionally so gaudy, have given 

 way to more sober hues and combinations. As the whole 

 of the colour in modern commerce in dyeing and printing 

 is produced, practically so to speak, by aniline and analogous 

 dyes, it has been found comparatively simple to imitate 

 and produce the more sober hues by the admixture in 

 varying proportions of these chemical dyes, not, it is true, 

 so perfectly as to prevent detection by the skilled eye, or 

 more effectually by laboratory tests, but sufficiently so as 

 to subdue the garish effects I have mentioned. 



Hence, it may be argued, are aniline dyes to be totally 

 condemned ? 



Much as we justly condemn in the aniline dj^es all that 

 is so garish and so fugitive, we are led to the consideration 

 of the controversy of to-day as to whether we may legiti- 

 mately use aniline dyes, or, in fact, any fugitive dyes, and 

 their combined coloured effects, or not. 



I do not wish to be an apologist for fugitive dyes, whether 

 the source be aniline or not, but in fairness I ought not to 



