Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 42.djvu/107

 Rh probably an intermediary of trade between the southern and northern countries. In his journeys to Italy he became acquainted with the paper-mills, and observing the prosperity of the Fabrianos, Cividales, and Battaglias, recognized the immense importance of the trade. It was a short step to decide to establish a paper-mill at home. There being no paper-makers in Germany, he secured the brothers Marco and Francisco di Marchia and their boy Bartolomeo in Italy and brought them to Nuremberg. He built his mill in the so-called Gleissmühle, which was situated not far from Nuremberg, near the present Hallerniese. Whether he built a new mill or only adapted an old grist-mill or oil-mill, of which we know nothing, he had to prepare new machinery for paper-making, including stamps, presses, and tubs, and sorting and drying rooms. Notwithstanding these apparatus were of the simplest character, their construction required considerable time, for work was done more slowly in those days than now. When, therefore, Stromer reports that he began paper-making on St. John's day, we must suppose either that months or years had been spent before that in hard work, or that he did not begin the actual making of paper, but only the building of his mill, on that St. John's day. The latter seems, in fact, to have been the case, for Stromer says that it was then that he set the wheel—that is, the water-wheel by which the stamping machine was propelled.

The view of the interior of an old German paper-mill in the year 1568 (Fig. 2) is taken from a woodcut by Jost Amman. In the left background are seen through the window the paddles and upper part of two water-wheels, which, moved by the stream without, drive the works within, especially the large roller that lies against the wall. This, it may be seen, is furnished with projecting beaters which are designed to hit upon the knee-bent stamps visible in front, and work them up and down. The heavy stamps lie with their hammer-shaped ends in a rectangular trough, in which the rags are placed after having been cut up and macerated. These stamps, with their heavy blows on the rags, beat them till the cloth and its threads are resolved into a fine lint, which, bleached, washed, and mixed with an adhesive substance, are carried, a semi-fluid mass, into the draw-tubs. The papermaker draws the pulp from them with a rectangular metallic sieve, and, while the water is dripping out through the meshes in the bottom, he shakes the fibrous mass that is left till it lies smoothly on the wire-work, felted into an even, homogeneous leaf. This is the still moist paper, which now laid between felts is placed in the powerful press that is seen behind the workman, and freed from water and made smooth. When this is done, the sheet is taken out of the press, carried in piles by apprentices to