An early example of European paper is preserved in the Record Office in London. It is a letter from the Count of Toulouse to Henry III., and is dated A.D. 1216. In France, however, by this time, the making of paper had been understood for some time, as it was made there in 1189. In Belgium it was not made until 1551, in which year a paper mill was set up at Tourneppe by Henri de Nevere. By the end of the fifteenth century paper-making in Europe was perfectly understood, and the papers of that date, and for some time after it, are frequently excellent in every way, and as sound, strong, and good now as they were when first made. The first English book printed on English paper is Bartholomaeus, _De Proprietatibus Rerum_, published 1495-6. The paper is of high quality, it shows a fine wire mark, and a watermark of a double circle enclosing an eight-pointed star. The paper was made at Hertford by John Tate, who was afterwards Lord Mayor of London; the title page is cut in wood, and the book is illustrated with outline wood-cuts. At the end are some verses, and among these occur the lines:-- “And John Tate the younger Joye mote he broke, Which late hath in England doo make this paper thynne, That now in our Englysch this boke is prynted Inne.” It is paper to be proud of, and John Tate the younger would unquestionably look upon the large majority of our modern papers with the utmost scorn, and he would be perfectly justified in doing so. The early method of making paper was to allow the pulp to settle at the bottom of a trough like a sieve, with a wire bottom, in which the wires were arranged in a certain way, thick and thin, the trade mark of the maker also being outlined in wire. The faint marks these wires cause in the paper are called watermarks, and although at first they were makers’ marks, they eventually denoted the size of the sheet of paper on which they were shown. The present method of making paper from rags is to pulp them thoroughly in water, and let the white particles become so thoroughly diffused that the liquid in which they float looks like thin milk.