PAPER MANUFACTURE. In early times the materials used for writing upon wore chiefly such as only required some little mechanical fashioning to fit them for that purpose. Smooth flat stones, clay afterwards burnt, waxed boards, plates of iron or metal, leaves and bark, skins and intestines, papyrus, and parchment, were all employed. The art of making paper from fibrous matter reduced to a pulp in water appears to have been first discovered by the Chinese about the year 95 A.D. In the time of Confucius they wrote with a style, or bodkin, on the inner bark of the bamboo. The Chinese paper is made from the inner bark of the bamboo, but the Chinese also make paper from cotton and linen rags, and a coarse yellow sort for wrap pers is made from rice straw.
In respect to the rise of This manufacture in England, a Mr. Tate is said to have had a paper-mill at Hertford early in the 16th century: and another mill is stated to have been established in 1598 at Dartford in Kent, by a German, who was knighted by Queen Elizabeth. Great improvements were intro duced in the manufacture by Thomas Watson, in 1713 ; but it was not till recent times that the manufacture reached any high degree of excellence.
In the making of paper any fibrous vegeta ble substance may be used, such as bark, stalks, tendrils, hop-bine, and wheat-straw. Nothing however has yet been found to answer so well as linen, hempen, or cotton rags.- The sweepings of the cotton-mills are also much used.
In all kinds of paper-making, whether from the bark of trees or other fibrous matter, or from rags, the general process is the same. The fibrous material is cut and bruised in water till it is separated into fine and short filaments, and becomes a sort of pulp. This pulp is taken up in a thin and even layer upon a mould of wire cloth, or something similar, which allows the water to drain off, but re thins the fibrous matter, the filaments of which are, by the process of reduction to pulp and subsequent drying and pressing, so inter woven or felted together, that they cannot be separated without tearing, and thus form paper. The rags of our country do not con stitute a fourth part of the quantity which we use in making paper : Italy and Germany furnish the principal supplies.
In every paper-mill the first business is to sort the rags and cut them into small pieces. This is done by women, each of whom is pro vided with a large knife to cut The rags. Threads and seams are carefully put by them selves : if ground with the cloth they would form specks in the paper. The rags, when cut, are thrown into five or six different com partments of a large chest, according to their qualities. Only the finest linen rags are used
for the best writing paper, but cotton as well as linen rags are now used for printing-paper. Hempen rags are used for coarse paper, and old cordage and tarred ropes for brown wrap ping papers.
The rags are now to be washed, which is lone either with hot water in a fulling-mill, or they are subjected for some hours to the action Df steam. The colour is taken out of them by a careful use of chlorine. The rags, after being washed, are subjected to the action of I revolving cylinder, the surface of which is Imnished with a number of sharp teeth or :utters, which are so placed as to act against ,her cutters fixed beneath the cylinder. The •ags are kept immersed in water, and sub ected to the action of the cutters for several lours, till they are minutely divided and re luced to a thin pulp.
The pulp, or sluff, as it is technically called, a now ready to be made into paper, which is dons either by hand or by machine. In the hand method, the stuff is put into a large vat, and is kept at a proper temperature either by a stove or steam-pipe, and the fibrous matter is held in suspension by stirring. The paper is made with a mould and deckle. The mould is a shallow square frame covered with wire cloth, and a little larger than the sheet intended to be made upon it. The deckle is a very thin frame of wood which fits close upon the mould, and is required to retain the stuff on the mould, and to limit the site of the sheet. The dipper, or vatman, inclining the mould a little towards him, dips it into the vat with the deckle upon it, and lifts it up again horizontally. lie shakes it to distribute the stuff equally, and the water drains through the wire. He lays the mould on the edge of the vat, and takes off the deckle, which he requires to apply to another mould. After re maining two or three seconds to drain the mould is taken by another workman, the coacher, who, having deposited the sheet of paper upon a piece of woollen cloth, returns the mould to the dipper, who in the meantime has made another sheet, which stands on the vat ready to be couched upon another felt spread over the former sheet. • Thus they proceed till they have made a pile bf sheets, called a post, consisting of six or eight quires. This post, with its felts, is placed in the vat press, and subjected to a strong pressure to force out the superfluous water, and to give firmness and solidity to the paper. The pile is then removed from the vat-press, the felts taken out, and the sheets are pressed again by themselves. They are then taken from the press and hung up, five or six together, in the drying-room.