Page:A Desk Book on the Etiquette of Social Stationary.djvu/88

 These filaments when mixed with water produce a soft, pulpy mass, and this soft, pulpy mass is the basis of writing paper.

It is manifest that if there is anything foreign in the water used in diluting this pulp, it will prevent the production of perfectly white pulp, so the water must be absolutely pure.

To secure this at Dalton they do not depend on the streams which flow through the Berkshire Hills, clean and pure as they are. They do not depend even upon the springs which at Dalton are singularly pure and clear.

The purest spring may have some sediment, may be stirred up by a falling leaf.

Formerly spring water was used, but in the search for cleaner water, artesian wells were bored, an even cleaner water was found, and 's papers became perceptibly whiter. To give you some little idea of the importance of water in paper-making, it may be stated that it takes over one hundred gallons of artesian well water to make one pound of.