Page:Archaeological Journal, Volume 4.djvu/31

Rh or any other expedient has been superseded by the general use of a foreign production, the caontchouc, or Indian rubber. Of the introduction of this very valuable material, the following extract from the preface to Priestly's Perspective, published in 1770, gives as positive a date as we can well expect.

"Since this work was printed I have seen a substance excellently adapted to the purpose of wiping from paper the marks of a black-lead pencil. It must therefore be of singular use to those who practise drawing. It is sold by Mr. Nairn, mathematical instrument maker, opposite the Royal Exchange. He sells a cubical piece of about half an inch for three shillings, and he says it will last several years."

A. The date of the invention of parchment has not been precisely ascertained, but it dates from times prior to the age of Herodotus; the substitution of the skin of the calf for that of the sheep, forming vellum, was probably an improvement of a more recent period. In England in earlier times the use of papyrus, as also of the Oriental paper made of cotton, was un- known, and parchment was exclusively employed. The earliest fabrication of paper from linen rags, originated probably by the cotton paper used in the East as early as the ninth century, has been attributed to the twelfth century. The most ancient document on such paper known to exist, according to De Vaines, appeared to be a German charter, dated 1239; a letter exists amongst the records at the Tower of London, addressed to Henry III., and written previously to 1222, which appears to be upon strong paper of mixed materials. Several letters of the following reign, preserved in the Tower, are evidently written on cotton paper. Paper was first manufactured in England by John Tate, the younger, of Hartford, at the close of the fifteenth century.—See Meerman, Obs. de chartæ lineæ origine, ed. Van Vaasen, 1767; Dom de Vaines, Dict. de Diplomatique; Gough's notices of Paper, Archæol., vol. viii, p. 158; three valuable remarks by Mr. Ottley, Archa3ol., vol. xxvi. p. 69, and Herbert's account of Tate, the first English paper maker, Dibdin's Typ. Ant., vol. ii. p. 320.

B. As it is certain that the ancients made use of common lead for the purpose of ruling lines, it seems highly probable that architects or designers might have adopted the use of the same convenient means of producing working drawings. The scribes used a small round plate of lead, which was found more convenient than a leaden style, being less liable to become