316 DYEING AND CALICO PRINTING. 



of steam in a close chamber or over a perforated cylinder, or the pieces 

 are passed through a tin solution, the oxide of tin being precipitated on 

 the fabric by a chemical process, when the colour, properly thickened, is 

 printed and afterwards submitted to the action of steam. It is chiefly 

 by this style of printing that such fine effects are produced upon mixed 

 fabrics of cotton and wool. 



Since 1855, the production of furniture prints by machinery has under- 

 gone a great development, owing to several important improvements ; 

 firstly, to the great advances in the art of engraving rollers ; secondly, 

 to the manufacture and employment of very large rollers, some of which 

 have a circumference of forty-three inches, and a length of forty-four ; 

 thirdly, to the easy application of the gum roller, which resulted in the 

 production of a class of goods first noticed at the Paris Exhibition of 

 1855. The gum roller deserves notice because of the extensive use now 

 made of it by the printers of furniture goods. It is, of course, understood 

 that, to produce light shades of colour, the darker ones are diluted witli 

 gum-water or reducing liquid : this was the work of the colour mixer, 

 and, therefore, to print four colours and four shades of each colour, six- 

 teen rollers would be necessary. Mr. Burch's gum-roller reduces the 

 colour upon the cloth during the process of printing. The pattern of the 

 paler shades of each colour in a chintz design being engraved upon one 

 roller, an impression of reducing liquid is first given off upon the cloth, 

 then that of the other rollers following in the usual order ; where the 

 various colours fall upon the gum-water a lighter shade is produced, 

 owing to the dilution of the colour on those parts, which effect may be 

 still further heightened by lightly engraving the corresponding parts 

 oi the colouring roller, so that a less quantity of colours shall be 

 given off. 



The introduction of the tar colours has enabled the woollen and silk 

 printers to obtain, with the aid of steam, most excellent effects, by which 

 many of them, chiefly foreigners, have displayed a great variety of very 

 beautiful goods. 



There was in the French department, exhibited by Mr. Brunet Lecomte, 

 a most interesting display of printed silks obtained by a new mode of 

 printing silk warps, by which the woven fabric has all the appearance of 

 having been printed, though it is well known that when this is done in 

 the usual way the patterns have always a clouded and chine appearance. 

 Madder Styles. — The improvements which have occurred in this, 

 the most important branch of calico printing, since 1851, have tended to 

 facilitate, and consequently to cheapen production rather than to give us 

 finer or more brilliant-coloured goods. Improvements, more or less con- 

 siderable, have taken place in nearly every stage of the manufacture, but 

 it is not proposed in this report to enter into their details except into 

 those of one important improvement. Madder and its derivatives, how- 

 ever, play such a conspicuous part in calico printing, that this report 



