Intelligence and Miscellanies. IBS 



room, I came on, and proceeded to take the several meas- 

 ures for the preservation of the paintings, as stated in de- 

 tail in the following report, which I beg leave to submit to 

 the House. 



1st. All the paintings were taken down, removed from 

 their frames, taken off from the pannels over which they are 

 strained, removed to a dry warm room, and their separate- 

 ly and carefully examined. The material which forms the 

 basis of these paintings is a linen cloth, whose strength and 

 texture is very similar to that used in the top-gallant-sails of 

 a ship of war. The substances employed in forming a prop- 

 er surface for the artist, together with the colors, oils, &c. 

 employed by him in his work, form a sufficient protection 

 for the threads of the canvass on this face, but the back re- 

 mains bare, and of course, exposed to the deleterious in- 

 fluence of damp air. The eifect of this is first seen in the 

 form of mildew ; it was this which I dreaded ; and the ex- 

 amination showed that mildew was already commenced, and 

 to an extent which rendered it manifest that the continuance 

 of the same exposure, which they had hitherto undergone, 

 for a very few years longer, would have accomplished the de- 

 composition or rotting of the canvass, and the consequent 

 destruction of the paintings. The first thing to be done 

 was to dry the canvass perfectly, which was accomplished 

 by laying down each picture successively on its face, upon a 

 clean dry carpet, and exposing the back to the influence of 

 the warmth of a dry and well aired room. The next thing 

 was to devise and apply some substance which would act per- 

 manently as a preservative against future possible exposure. 



I had learned that a few years ago, some of the eminent 

 chemists of France had examined with great care several 

 of the ancient mummies of Egypt, with a view to ascertain 

 the nature of the substance employed by the embalmers, 

 which the lapse of so many ages had proved to possess the 

 power of protecting from decay a substance otherwise so 

 perishable as the human body. This examination had prov- 

 ed that, after the application of liquid asphaltum to the cav- 

 ities of the head and body, the whole had been wrapped 

 carefully in many envelopes, or bandages of linen prepar- 

 ed with wax. The committee of chemists decided further, 

 after a careful examination and analysis of the hieroglyphic 

 paintings with which the cases, &.c. are covered, that the col- 

 ors employed, and still retaining their vivid brightness, had 

 also been prepared and applied with the same substance. 



