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
About the end of the eighteenth century it became
necessary to make special papers denominated "safety
paper." Their manufacture has continued until the
present day although much limited, largely because
of the employment of mechanical devices which seek
to safety monetary instruments. Such safety papers
are of several kinds.
1. Paper made with distinguishing marks to indicate
proprietorship, as with the Bank of England
water mark, to imitate which is a felony. Or the
paper of the United States currency, which has silk
fibers united with the pulp, the imitation of which is
a felony.
2. Paper made with layers or materials which are
disturbed by erasure or chemical discharge of written
or printed contents, so as to prevent fraudulent
tampering.
3. Paper made of peculiar materials or color, to
prevent copying by photographic means.
A number of processes may be cited:
One kind is made of a pulp tinged with a stain
easily affected by chlorine, acids, or alkalis, and is
made into sheets as usual.
Water marks made by wires twined among the
meshes of the wire cloth on which the paper is
made.
Threads embodied in the web of the paper.
Colored threads systematically arranged were formerly
used in England for post-office envelopes and exchequer
bills.
Silken fibers mixed with the pulp or dusted upon
it in process of formation, as used in the United
States currency.
Tigere, 1817, treated the pulp of the paper, previous
to sizing, with a solution of prussiate of potash.
Sir Win. Congreve, 1819, prepared a colored layer
of pulp in combination with white layers, also by
printing upon one sheet and covering it with an
outer layer, either plain or water-marked.
Glynn and Appel, 1821, mixed a copper salt in the
pulp and afterward added an alkali or alkaline salt to
produce a copious precipitate. The pulp was then
washed and made into paper and thereafter dipped in
a saponaceous compound.
Stevenson, 1837, incorporated into paper a metallic
base such as manganese, and a neutral compound like
prussiate of potash, to protect writing from being tampered
with.
Varnham, 1845, invented a paper consisting of a
white sheet or surface on one or both sides of a colored
sheet.
Stones, 1851. An iodide or bromide in connection
with ferrocyanide of potassium and starch combined
with the pulp.
Johnson, 1853, employed the rough and irregular
surface produced by the fracture of cast iron or other
brittle metal to form a water mark for paper by taking
an impression therefrom on soft metal, gutta-
percha, etc., and afterward transferring it to the wire
cloth on which the paper is made.
Scoutteten, 1853, treated paper with caoutchoue
dissolved in bisulphide of carbon, in order to render
it impermeable and to prevent erasures or chemical
action.
Ross, 1854, invented water-lining or printing the
denomination of the note in colors while the pulp was
yet soft.
Evans, 1854, commingled a lace or open-work fabric
in the pulp.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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