Fibres. 



306 



[October, 1909. 



they consist of some earthen vats, 

 dhenki for pounding the waste paper, a 

 wooden mould, a bamboo sieve (ehhapri), 

 a wooden frame for supporting the 

 ehhapri, some mats for drying the sheets, 

 some dhundul fruits for applying the 

 starch, and a piece of plank and a smooth 

 stone for pressing the paper. The 

 ehhapri alone is a rather delicate thing. 

 It is procured from Serampore in the 

 Hooghly district where it is made. It 

 costs from Re. 1-4 to Rs, 2, and each piece 

 lasts from 2$ to 3 months. 



The dipping up of the pulp with the 

 ehhapri is an operation requiring some 

 skill. One man can on an averaere pro- 

 duce 175 to 200 sheets per day (7 to 8 

 quires). One woman can size one side of 

 16 or 20 quires and polish about 12 quires 

 of paper pei day. The workmen receive 

 from Rs. 6 to Rs. 10 <>r Rs. 12 per month 

 accoidiug to their skill and outturn of 

 work. 



One maund of waste paper makes 

 about 30 seers of countr y paper. 

 Paper is made in several sizes : — 

 Bararukhi (the width of 12 fingers 



laid Bide by side) ... 12 quires. 



Sola rukhi or jangri (the width of 



16 fingers laid side by side) 4 or 5 ,, 

 Baira (generally used in zamindari 

 sarishtas) ... ... 8 or 9 ,, 



Baleswari white or blue (a thick 

 paper only made at Amta, dis- 

 trict of Howrah) ... 2 ,, 

 In this country hand-made paper has 

 apparently no chance against paper 

 made by machine. But in England the 

 most expensive writing and drawing 

 papers are still made by hand. Some 

 60 or 70 tons of it are said to be made in 

 every works in Great Britain, and ou 

 account of its superior strength there is 

 a steady demand for it. In America, 

 however, papers of great strength are 

 manufactured by machinery and not 

 much hand-made paper is produced. 



Even in the case of hand-made paper 

 the pulp is always made with machine, 



only the finest qualities of rags being 

 used for the purpose. The ' ehhapri,' in- 

 stead of being made of bamboo slips, con- 

 sists of a fine wire cloth. The sheets of 

 paper as they leave the mould, instead of 

 being filed up in direct contact with each 

 other, are separated from each other by 

 felt placed between one sheet and the 

 next. The sheets are dried with parti- 

 cular care and the sizing is done with 

 gelatine. The glazing is done by machine 

 as in the case of other paper. The 

 greater strength of hand-made paper 

 is supposed to be due partly to the 

 time allowed tc the fibres to knit to- 

 gether, and partly to the fibre expansion 

 permitted them during drying. 



But in China and Japan common paper 

 is said to be still made by hand. It 

 would be interesting to ascertain 

 under what conditions this has so long 

 been possible, and what the prospects 

 of the industry may be. It is super- 

 fluous to say that there is a good deal 

 in common between the industrial condi- 

 tions of those countries and India, for 

 instance, the low wages of labour, 

 the simplicity of tools, the general ab- 

 sence of the factory system, etc. Some 

 of the students lately sent to Japan by 

 the Society for the Industrial and Tech- 

 nical Education of Indians might look 

 into the problem. Government might 

 also obtain a report from some authori- 

 tative agent on the subject. Poor, ignor- 

 ant and broken-spirited, it is hopeless 

 to expect the Kajis to make any im- 

 provements in their time-honoured ways 

 without some help from outside. It is 

 impossible to say without an inquiry 

 abroad whether the industry has any 

 chance of being saved at all. The few 

 men who are still engaged in it will soon 

 disappear, and their descendants will be 

 forced to betake themselves to other 

 lines of life as best as they can. And 

 then it will be too late to make any 

 effort to revive the industry. 



DRUGS AND MEDICINAL PLANTS. 



NOTE ON IPECACUANHA 

 CULTIVATION. 



By E. M. Holmes, f.l.s., 

 Curator of the Pharmaceutical Society's 

 Museums. 



(Prom the Agricultural Bulletin of 

 the Straits and F. M. S., Vol. VIII., No. 8, 

 August, 1909.) 



About a year ago I pointed out, with 

 respect to the Ipecacuanha cultivated 

 near Klang, in the protectorate of 



Selangor, that it was found by Mr. 

 Pfenningwerth, the manager of the 

 estate where it is cultivated, that al- 

 though the fresh crop from fresh soil 

 was a fairly good one, on trying to raise 

 a second it invariably turned out very 

 poor, although all kinds of manure had 

 been tried to enrich the land, without 

 apparently restoring to the soil the neces- 

 sary ingredients for luxuriant growth. 

 Under these circumstances, it occurred 

 to me that it would be interesting to de- 

 termine the mineral constituents of the 

 root itself, so that if these were known 



