A practical treatise on dyeing, and callicoe printing: exhibiting the processes in the French, German, English, and American practice of fixing colours on woollen, cotton, silk, and linen

Front matter

CATALOGUE

OF

medical, botanical, and chemical

Preface

XHE art of Dyeing is of great importance to a country that manufactures cloth of any kind. It adds to the beauty and contributes to the economy of the material whether woollen, silk, cotton or linen: it therefore encourages the demand.

In France, under Colbert, it was the subject of many governmental regulations, having for their object the distinction between true and false dyes; that is, permanent or fugitive colours, the great or the lesser dye. Colbert meant well, but he did not know in that day the value of the advice “ Let us alone to manage our own affairs.” Laissez nous J'aire.

The only good books on dyeing, however, we owe to France; — Hellot for woollen, Macquer for silk, D’Apligny for cotton, and lately Berthollet and Sons, with Bouillon La Grange’s edition of Homassel. These are the most valuable books of a dyer’s library.

In England, Haigh’s Dyer’s Assistant is little more than a copy of Hellot. Bancroft, who having discovered and secured a monopoly of the bark of the American black oak, turned his attention to dyeing, has published a very valuable treatise, but not a practical one. The history and description of the drugs used, and the theory that pervades the book, is excellent. I know of no book on the subject, however, that is original, practical, and English. All the books

IV there published on the subject, Bancroft’s excepted, are either copies of Hellot, or catchpenny compilations of no value. On callicoe printing, England has furnished but one book, published about twenty-five years ago, and of no value. That manufacturing and jealous nation, conceals all the knowledge by which other nations could profit in a manufacturing point of view.

In Germany I know of nothing but Gulich’s, Scheft'er’s and Poerner’s treatises, which are rather experimental than didactic and practical. D’Ambourney’ work, though very curious, and opening a field of future utility, is also of no use to the practical dyer.

In this country two books have been published on the subject, one a thin duodecimo, by Asa Ellis of Connecticut, and another lately by Elijah Bemiss of New York State. They are both practical books, containing processes manifestly copied from experience. Asa Ellis’s book contains no theory, and his receipts can for the most part be depended on. That of Elijah Bemiss, although the first part is manifestly the work of a practical dyer, yet it is marked by such a total ignorance of chemical principles, and some of the receipts are so strange, that although a man who understands the theory of dyeing may make a good use of some parts of it, the work is not of equal merit with those which have preceded it. Still it is a book worth having, the proportions are tolerably good, and suited to the present state of this country.

The sources to which I have applied, are Hellot, Macquer, Berthollet, Homassel, and occasionally to Asa Ellis.

V

Thirty years ago, dyeing and printing occupied much of my time experimentally and practically: my strong and decided liking for ihese.branches of industry, has kept me alive to every improvement I could hear of since I iiave been in this country; and my chemical pursuits have enabled me to understand these subjects certainly better than a merely practical man.

I consider therefore that I am (jualified to judge of what is likely to be to the purpose among a variety of receipts, as well as can reasonably be expected. But although I have dyed every colour upon cotton with my own hands heretofore, and that not by way of experiment, but for the market, and although I have superintended with anxious care the dyeing and the colour shop of the printing department at my own establishment, this is so long ago, that much has escaped my recollection, and probably much is known to others who have con- ' tinued in the practice, which is now unknown to me. Still, 1 send out this book, as upon the whole the best book on the subjects of dyeing and printing now extant, scanty as the information may seem.

It is very singular that in the voluminous publication, Rees’s Cycloptedia, I can find nothing on dyeing generally, and only two articles relating to the subject of printing. Can this be a wilful omission in the common jealous manufacturing spirit of the country? However, in the article dyeing, the English may have cheaper, but they have not better processes than the French have published; nor in general is the English dye house as good as the French; or their cloths so well dyed.

VI

With us, and in the infancy of our manufacture, it is all important that we should reject as much as possible fugitive, and use only permanent colours. For this purpose it is worth while to go to the expense of these colours. At present, the English manufacture cheaper, dye cheaper, and finish their goods far superior to every other nation as well as our own; but if our cloth and our colours are substantially better, if they will last longer than the English, it will compensate in a great degree both for inferior finish and higher price. My receipts therefore are not of the cheapest kind. I have uniformly rejected the fraudulent and fugitive dyes, and insisted on the fast colours.

This work I know to be incomplete, particularly in the department of callicoe printing, but where will the reader find a better? This is my apology.

I have often been asked for a treatise on dyeing, which shall contain in a small compass all the best receipts for each colour, rejecting all inferior ones: so that an unlettered and practical man, can go to work with a full reliance on the process laid down for him; and an excellent book this would certainly be.

But those who ask for it, are not aware, that in all probability no man living is competent to such a selection. Almost every dye shop has its peculiar recipes, and processes. The directions given by the most approved authors greatly differ from each other. Different processes will suit some countries better than others, and different localities in the same country. A dyer in New York or Philadelphia, will use drugs imported, for which a dyer in the back country will be

Vll induced to find a substitute. This has induced me by way of appendix to insert D’Ambourney’s experiments on the colours produced by different woods, satisfied that such a set of experiments made on our own woods, would probably lead to many useful results.

The plan of the following treatise is much in this wise.

Suppose I were a dyer, and a young lad sent to me to be instructed in the art:

I should first expect of him a good knowledge of the elements of chemistry; for it is a farce to talk of a dyer who is ignorant of chemical science; every step he takes must be in the dark; he cannot move but by rote.

I should then instruct him in the materials used in the art of dyeing: Bancroft’s book, to which mine is a practical supplement, will do this better than any other.

I should then carry him if I could, to the best dye houses in the neighbourhood, and show him the processes there used for each colour on the respective kinds of stuff*.

Then I would bring him home and make him dye the same colours in my own dye house, explaining the reasons of difference, wherever my practice differed from my neighbours’.

I have done so in this book. I have placed the reader in the French, the German, the English dye houses: I have given him the processes of each country, where I could get at them; I have then given my remarks on these processes, and my own alterations founded on those remarks, leaving him then to exer-

Vlll cise his own judgment. I think this is far better than confining him to a single receipt, under the notion that I was duly qualified to select the very best, and infallible in my judgment. I know that I am not so, and therefore I have not pretended to this very desirable qualification.

In fact the art of dyeing is yet in its infancy. No one but a good chemist, who is at the same time a good dyer, can form any judgment of the very many unascertained points that yet remain as desiderata in this art. I have felt this at almost every page of the work. It is in dyeing as in all other branches of knowledge, a man must know much, before he is aware how ignorant he is. The only cure for the evil, is the general introduction of chemical knowledge, which bears upon the principles of almost every art and trade that subserves the comfort or convenience of common life.

Such as the book is, I believe it will be useful in its way, and I am glad thus to contribute my mite to the treasury of practical knowledge, of which this country stands so much in need.

THOMAS COOPER.

Index

A.

•AcETAT of alumine^ directions for making, 7.

Alder Bark, 14. Of its use in the brown dye, 185.

Annatto, (Rocou), 23. Its application in the silk dye, 208.

Archil, (orseille, roccella) 17.

Aurora, how composed for the woollen dye, 175. For silk, 211.

B.

Bancroft, Dr. his proposals on the scarlet dye, 142—148. His mordant for quercitron bark in the woollen dye, 172.

Barberry Root, 20.

Barry red, 141.

Berthollets’ (Messrs.) remarks on the Indigo vat of Rouen, 64. Their process for setting the vat, 65. Receipts for the common pencil blue of the callicoe printers, 67 — 69. Method of dyeing scarlet, 124 — 128. Remarks on the use of sumach, 183. Process for dyeing Saxon green, 180. On the black dye for silk, 239.

Birch tree, 20.

Black, Hellot’s process for dyeing, 87. Method of Homassel, 90. Haigh’s process, 94 — 96; another, by Asa Ellis, 96. Method of dyeing common blacks, 98. Homassel’s vat for dyeingsilk, 237 — 239. Macquer’s process, 239. Of dyeing cotton this colour, 271 — 279.

Blue. — Of the drugs used for this colour, 20 — 23. Method of dyeing blue on woollen and cotton, 35, et seq. How dyed on woollen with indigo alone, 44. Pencil blue of the callicoe printers, 67 — 70. Proportions of ingredients used for dyeing this colour by the English, French and German dyers, 74 — 78. The Editor’s proce* s for dyeing blue on woollens, 79. Of its various shades with red, 162 — 165. On the dyeing silk this colour, 249 — 254. Of the blue dye on cotton, 270. Of the Blue vat of the callicoe printers, 362, et aeg.

Bran and madder vat, — how made and used, 45.

b

X

Brazil ’■Mood, 16. Directions for using it in the red dye, 150. Ho\vused in dyeing cotton red, 280.

Brazilletto, 16,

Brown. Of the processes for dyeing the different shades of this colour, 177 — 182. Directions for this colour on cotton, 303.

Buff yellow on woollen, 173. On cotton, 308 — 312.

C.

Cam wood, 16.

Carthamus, 17.

Carmelite, how dyed on woollen, 175. On silk, 214.

Callicoe firinting. Observations on, 316 — 335. Of the process for preparing callicoes, making mordants, and printing raised colours, 336 — 352. Observations on raising madder colours, 352. Colours raised by w'eld, 354. With quercitron, 356, Of colours to be raised in weld and madder, conjointly, or in quercitron and madder, ib. Of colours to be raised in weld or quercitron and logwood, 357. Single blacks to be raised with logwood and sumach, 358. Colours to be raised in lime water and potash, 358 — 360. Colours to be raised in lime, copperas and potash, 360. On dipping, 361 — 389. Of Pencil colours, 389. Of chemical colours, 390 — 422. Of printing by discharging colours already dyed, 422 — 424. Homassel’s remarks on callicoe printing, 424, et seq.

China Blue, on the manner of making, 70 — another process, 71. Proportion of ingredients used by the English dyers, 78. For callicoe printing, 385. 444.

Chemical colours, 452 — 459.

Cochineal, 17.

Colour 7)iaking, 395 — 422.

Cotton. Remarks on the mordants requisite for this substance, 262 — 264. On bleaching cotton goods, 265 — 269. Of the blue dye for cotton, 270. Of the Black dye, 271 — 279. Of scarlet, 279, 280. Of brazil reds, 280. Of pink, 281. 315. Of madder reds, 282 — 303. Of the Turkey red, 286 — 299. 314. Of browns and chocolates, 303. Of violet, ib. Of the yellow dye, 304 — 308. Of buff colours, 308. 312. Orange, 310. Cinnamon, ib. Drabs, ib. Olives, 311. Nankins, 309. 312. Greens, 313. Coquelicot, ib. Puce or flea colour, ib. Grays, ib. Black, ib.

I

XI

Crimson. Hellot’s method of dyeing Genoa crimson on silk, 220 — . 224. Macquer’s process for fine crimson, 224. Of the false or brazil crimson, 227. Violet crimson of Italy, 228. Homassel’s fine crimson, 229. Brazil crimson, 28!. 315.

D.

Drab. Of the processes for dyeing the different shades of this colour, 176.

Drugs., colouring. How tested, 2. Of the kinds used in dyeing, 12, et seq.

Dye-house. General directions for arranging it, 10. Of the utensils, See, required, 28.

F.

Fustic, old, 19. How used in the yellow dye, 169.

Fustic, young (Fustet, Venice sumach) 19. How employed in the silk dye, 214.

G.

Galls, Alefifio, 13. Berthollet’s experiments on, ib.

Golden Rod (Solidago), 20.

Gold colour. How dyed on silk, 211.

Grays. Of the processes for dyeing the different shades of this colour, 100 — 103. 182.313.

Green, Bottle. Process for dyeing this colour on woollen, 176. On silk, by Homassel, 260. On cotton, 3 13.

Green. Directions for dyeing a fast green, 185. Homassel’s method of dyeing Saxon green, 187. Berthollet’s process, 188. Macquer’s directions for dyeing silk this colour, 256 — 258. Homassel’s method, 259. On cotton, 313.

H.

Haussman's remarks on the indigo vat, 65.

Hellot’s process for dyeing black, 87. His method of making the scarlet composition, 103 — 105; and of dyeing scarlet, 105 — 124. Process for dyeing with weld, 167. On brown from walnut rinds, 179. Directions for dyeing the Genoa crimson on silk, 220 — 224.

Homassel — His directions for sulphuring, 32. Process for setting the pastel or woad vat, 41 — 44. Method of setting the indigo vat, 50. Observations on the callicoe dyers’ blue vat, 71 Directions for making pencil blue, 73. Process for dyeing black, 90. His mordant for fast and bright grays, 100. Pro-

I

*

xii ' i

i cesses for common scarlet and rose colour, 147. Method of using brazil wood in the red dye, 150, Processes for violets and purples, 163. Observations on yellow colours, 167 — 171.

On the brown from walnut rind, 180. Method of dyeing Saxon green, 187. Process for dyeing fine crimson on silk,

2S9. Scarlet, 231. Pink, 232—236. Black, 237. Green, 259. Remarks on callicoe printing, 424, et seq.