WOOD PULP FOR PAPER. 117 
Monthly Journal,' and from the fact that this wood pulp is advertised 
for sale in London. We have specimens in our collection of many wood 
papers, and also of wood pulp which was shown at the Exhibition in 
1862 from Sweden and Germany. 
A French lady has succeeded in manufacturing excellent paper from 
wood, and at a price much lower than that made from rags. Her method 
consists chiefly in the use of a new kind of machinery for reducing the 
wood to fine fibres, which are afterwards treated with the alkalis and 
acids necessary to reduce them to pulp, and the composition is finally 
bleached by the action of chlorine. By means of a series of parallel 
vertical wheels, armed with fine points, which are caused to pass over 
the surface of the wood in the direction of its fibres, the surface of the 
wood is marked, and the outer layer is formed into a kind of net, with- 
out woof, composed of separate threads. This layer of fine threads is 
afterwards removed by means of a plane, which is passed across the wood, 
and the portion thus removed, which resembles lint or flax, is then treated 
with ehlorine, &c. Specimens have thus been made consisting of a mix- 
ture of 80 per cent, of wood pulp, and 20 per cent, of rag pulp, and 
sheets have been tried by printers, lithographers, and others, with very 
satisfactory results. It is the unanimous opinion of the engravers and 
lithographers who have used it, that paper made according to this me- 
thod, from wood, and which costs only 161. per ton is quite equal to the 
China paper, which costs 214Z. per ton. It is confidently expected that 
experiments upon a large scale will confirm the results already obtained. 
The range of choice of wood for paper making is by no means 
limited ; the pine family contributes, however, most largely to the 
manufacture. But another question of economy arises which has ex- 
cited much inquiry and invention, namely, the most advantageous 
method of reducing solid wood to the requisite degree of fineness for 
subsequent treatment. 
The most ingenious method of disintegrating the fibre of wood which 
we have yet heard of is a Yankee M notion." Wood is placed in a cannon, 
the mouth of which is plugged up. High-pressure steam is then forced 
in through the touch-hole, and when the pressure rises to a sufficient 
degree, the plug, together with the wood, is blown out, the latter being 
reduced to the appearance of wool by the expansive force of the steam, 
with which its pores have been filled whilst in the cannon. Experiments 
conducted by Mr. Eobertson, at the Albion Foundry, Hobart Town, to 
illustrate the practicability of thus exploding bark into fibre by steam 
power, proved highly successful : the bark, which was inserted in large 
solid masses into what we may call the steam-digester, being discharged 
in the shape of a fine fibre. 
In some Belgian paper-mills wood is now used as a substitute for 
rags, to the extent of from 20 to 30 per cent., for printing papers. 
Early in 1826, the brothers Cappucino, papermakers of Turin, dis- 
covered the means of supplying the want of rags by the fabrication of 
