第108章

1. Charter hieratica--sacred paper, used only for books on religion. From adulation of Augustus it was also called charta augusta and charta livia.

2. Charta amphitheatrica--from the place where it was fabricated.

3. Charta fannia--from Fannius, the manufacturer.

4. Charta saitica--from Sais in Egypt. This appears to have been a coarser kind.

5. Charta toeniotica--from the place where made, now Damietta. This was also of a less fine quality.

6. Charta claudia. This was an improvement of the charta hieratica, which was too fine.

7. Charta emporitica. A coarse paper for parcels.

There was also a paper called macrocollum, which was of a very large size.

Of all these, he says, the charta claudia was the best.

The ink-written rolls of papyrus were placed vertically in a cylindrical box called capsula. It is very evident that a great number of such volumes might be comprised in this way within a small space, and this may tend to explain the smallness of the rooms which are considered to have been used for containing the ancient libraries.

At Mentz, in Upper Germany, is a leaf of parchment on which are fairly written twelve different kinds of handwritings in six different inks also a variety of miniatures and drawings curiously done with a pen by one Theodore Schubiker, who was born without hands and performed the work with his feet.

In Rome the very plate of brass on which the laws of the ten tables are written is still to be seen.

Stylographic inks should not be used upon records, most of them are aniline. The absence of solid matter, which makes them desirable for the stylographic pen, unfits them for records.

Never add water to ink. While an ink which has water as its base might, under certain conditions bear the addition of an amount equal to that lost by evaporation, as a rule the ink particles which have become injured will not assimilate again.

One of the best methods to cleanse a steel pen after use, is to stick it in a raw (white) potato.

Inks which are recommended as permanent, because water will not remove them, while it does immediately obliterate others, may not be permanent as against time. These inks may be the best for monetary purposes, but, owing to an excess of acid in them, may be dangerous in time to the paper.

It is interesting, since coal tar has acquired so important a position in the arts, to trace how its various products successively rose in value. The prices in Paris, as given by M. Parisal in 1861, are as follows:

Coal,.................................. 1/4 c. per lb.

Coal tar,.............................. 3/4 " "Heavy coal oil,.............. 2 1/2 a 3 3/4 " "Light coal oil,............. 6 3/4 a 10 1 /4 " "Benzole,........................ 10 1/2 a 13 " "Crude nitro-benzole,................ 57 a 61 " "Rectified nitro-benzole,............ 82 a 96 " "Ordinary aniline,............. $3.27 a $4.90 " "Liquid aniline violet,.............. 28 a 41 " "Carmine aniline violet,....... 32 c. a $1.92 "Pure aniline violet, in powder,.... $245 a $326.88 "The last is equal to the price of gold. And so, says M. Parisal, from coal, carried to its tenth power, we have gold; the diamond is to come.

Modern chemistry offers many formulas and methods of rendering visible secret or sympathetic inks. Writing made with any of the following solutions, and permitted to dry, is invisible. Treatment by the means cited will render them visible.

Solution. After treatment. Color produced.

Acetate of lead. Sulphuret of potassiurin. Brown.

Gold in nitrohydroChloric acid. Tin in same acid. Purple.

Nut-galls. Sulphate of iron. Black.

Dilute sulphuric acid. Heat. Black.

Cobalt in dilute Heat. Green. nitrohydrochloric acid.

Lemon juice. Heat. Brown.

Oxide of copper in Heat. Blue. acetic acid and salt Nitrate of bismuth. Infusions of Nutgalls. Brown.

Common starch. Iodine in alcohol. Purple.

Colorless iodine. Chloride of lime. Brown.

Phenolphtalin. Alkaline solution. Red.

Vanadium. Pyrogallic acid. Purple.

The Patent Office at Washington, D. C., for more than forty years employed a violet copying ink made of logwood. From 1853 until 1878 it was furnished by the Antoines of Paris, of the brand termed "Imperial;" in later years it was supplied by the Fabers.

Since 1896 they have been using "combined" writing fluids.

The following facts elicited by the unrollment of a mummy at Bristol, England, in 1853, were communicated to the Philosophical Magazine, by Dr. Herapath.

He says:

"On three of the bandages were hieroglyphical characters of a dark color, as well defined as if written with a modern pen; where the marking fluid had flowed more copiously than the characters required, the texture of the cloth had become decomposed and small holes had resulted. I have no doubt that the bandages were genuine, and had not been disturbed or unfolded; the color of the marks were so similar to those of the present 'marking ink,' that I was induced to try if they were produced by silver. With the blowpipe Iimmediately obtained a button of that metal; the fibre of the linen I proved by the microscope, and by chemical reagents, to be linen; it is therefore certain that the ancient Egyptians were acquainted with the means of dissolving silver, and of applying it as a permanent ink; but what was their solvent?

I know of none that would act on the metal and decompose flax fibre but nitric acid, which we have been told was unknown until discovered by the alchemist in the thirteenth century, which was about 2200 years after the date of this mummy, according as its superscription was read.

"The Yellow color of the fine linen cloths which had not been stained by the embalming materials, I found to be the natural coloring matter of the flax; they therefore did not, if we judge from this specimen, practice bleaching. There were, in some of the bandages near the selvage, some twenty or thirty blue threads; these were dyed by indigo, but the tint was not so deep nor so equal as the work of the modern dyers; the color had been given it in the skein.