Chronology of the origin and progress of paper and paper-making

Preface

HE facts embraced in the following pages have been gathered from so many sources, that it would materially encumber the work to give authorities. The valuable essay of Breitkopf,1 published in 1784, and the interesting history of Matthias Koops,2 who made extensive experiments in England in the beginning of the present century, have furnished numerous data. The Jury Report of the London Industrial Exhibition has been used to a considerable extent for more modern statistics of European countries. For the remainder, almost every available work has been consulted in English, French, German, and Nederdutch, and the newspapers. Upon the accuracy of the figures in the statistics here given it is impossible implicitly to rely,

9 Historical Account of the Substances which have been used to describe Events, and to convey Ideas, from the earliest Date to the Invention of Paper, London, 1801, 8vo.

especially upon such as have been gathered from the newspapers, where careful comparison is seldom given. The compiler has availed himself of whatever came under his observation that had the appearance of authenticity, but has not always had opportunity to verify dates and quantities.

It will be seen by the number of experiments made for the attainment of the same object by the same means in England and America especially, that paper-makers have had but little intercommunication, and there has long been great want of an American work, practical and experimental, on this most important art, which it is thought the eminent work of Mr. Hoffman has not wholly supplied. An account of the modes that have been pursued by the experimenters who have so long and arduously sought after a substitute for rags in the manufacture of paper, would of itself form an instructive volume. These experiments began in Europe more than a century ago, and were induced by the same cause which has ever since given rise to efforts in the same direction, the scarcity of rags. They have continually exercised the minds of manufacturers and others in this country during the present century, and the records of the patent office attest the fertility of invention which has been expended in this field of discovery. The list given in former editions of this work of substances which have been experimented upon, and of which it is claimed that paper has been produced of fair qualities, shows in a measure the extent of the effort which has been made to procure material to meet the increasing demand for paper fabrics ; but they have now become so numerous, embracing almost everything in nature, that a repetition has been abandoned, as may well be done, since fish fibre has come in vogue, and sausages are cased in paper bladders, in place of animal intestines.

Not only have numerous patents been procured for useless modes of producing paper from various articles, for want of a knowledge of what had already been done in the same line, but costly machinery has in some cases been erected to assist in bringing them into use, after they had been experimented upon repeatedly and condemned. This will continue to be done until something is published on the subject in such a shape as to be accessible to the trade. It is hardly necessary to say that this work does not aim to supply the desideratum, yet to a considerable extent it will serve as an index to those experiments. It also indicates what has been done towards bringing machinery to perfection, while those efforts were being made to discover

4 Chronology of Paper Making.

new materials for paper stock. It is in this department that great results have been attained. In less than half a century, the machines have entirely superseded the diminutive hand-mills which sparsely dotted the country, and gigantic establishments have risen up in their places. Paper-mill villages, and banking institutions even, have grown out of this flourishing branch of industrial art, and we behold with satisfaction and amazement, what has been brought about by the aid of a commodity so insignificant in the eyes of the world as linen and cotton rags.

THE PAPYRUS PLANT.