Forty Centuries of Ink: Or, A chronological narrative concerning ink and its backgrounds, introducing incidental observations and deductions, parallels of time and color phenomena, bibliography, chemistry, poetical effusions, citations, anecdotes and curiosa together with some evidence respecting the evanescent character of most inks of to-day and an epitome of chemico-legal ink.Carvalho, David Nunes
History
Forty Centuries of Ink: Or, A chronological narrative concerning ink and its backgrounds, introducing incidental observations and deductions, parallels of time and color phenomena, bibliography, chemistry, poetical effusions, citations, anecdotes and curiosa together with some evidence respecting the evanescent character of most inks of to-day and an epitome of chemico-legal ink.
Carvalho, David Nunes
Ink
Take 6 quarts (beer measure) of clear water,
soft or hard, and boil in it for about an hour 4 oz.
of the best Campeachy logwood, chipped very thin
across the grain, adding, from time to time, boiling
water to supply in part the loss by evaporation;
strain the liquor while hot, and suffer it to
cool. If the liquor is then short of 5 quarts, make
it equal to this quantity by the addition of cold
water. After which let 1 lb. of bruised blue galls,
or 20 oz. of the best common galls, be added. Let
a paste be prepared by triturating 4 oz. of sulphate
of iron (green vitriol) calcined to whiteness, and
let half an ounce of acetite of copper (verdigris)
be well incorporated together with the above decoction
into a mass, throwing in also 3 oz. of coarse
brown sugar and 6 oz. of gum Senegal, or Arabic.
Put the materials into a stone bottle of such a size
as to half fill it; let the mouth be left open, and
shake the bottle well, twice or thrice a day. In
about a fortnight it may be filled, and kept in well-
stopped bottles for use. It requires to be protected
from the frost, which would considerably
injure it."
Infuse a pound of pomegranate peels, broken
to a gross powder, for 24 hours in a gallon and a
half of water, and afterwards boil the mixture till
1-3d of the fluid be wasted. Then add to it 1 lb.
of Roman vitriol, and 4 oz. of gum arabic powdered,
and continue the boiling till the vitriol and
gum be dissolved, after which the ink must be
strained through a coarse linen cloth, when it will
be fit for use.
"This ink is somewhat more expensive, and yet
not so good in hue as that made by the general
method, but the colour which it has is not liable to
vanish or fade in any length of time."
* * * * * * * *
"Infuse a pound of galls powdered and 3 ounces
of pomegranate peels, in a gallon of soft water for
a week, in a gentle heat, and then strain off the
fluid through a coarse linen cloth. Then add to it
8 oz. of vitriol dissolved in a quart of water, and
let them remain for a day or two, preparing in the
meantime a decoction of logwood, by boiling a
pound of the chips in a gallon of water, till 1-3d
be wasted, and then straining the remaining fluid
while it is hot. Mix the decoction and the solution
of galls and vitriol together, and add 5 oz. of gum
arabic, and then evaporate the mixture over a common
fire to about 2 quarts, when the remainder
must be put into a vessel proper for that purpose,
and reduced to dryness, by hanging the vessel in
boiling water. The mass left, after the fluid has
wholly exhaled, must be well powdered, and when
wanted for use, may be converted into ink by the
addition of water."
* * * * * * * *
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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