Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume III.djvu/601

 CALICO FEINTING 595 upon the manufacture was repealed ; but a tax of 3d. per yard was continued, which was in- creased in 1806 to 3|<2. In 1831 this duty was repealed ; and the art, which had sustained itself under all the attempts to keep it down, now that it was relieved of the burden of pay- ing an average of 50 per cent, on the goods produced for home consumption, suddenly re- ceived a great impetus, so that in place of 8,300,000 pieces of goods manufactured in 1830, the production was increased within 20 years to about 20,000,000. The character of the goods was greatly improved, as well as the pro- cesses and machinery ; while the cost of pro- duction was much reduced by the enormous quantities manufactured. The process of print- ing had been by wooden blocks, each one of which of a few inches square was applied by hand, impressing a portion of the figure upon the surface in a single color, and another block subsequently applied in the same spot to fill in another portion of the figure in another color. This process was soon nearly superseded by im- mense machines constructed with the greatest ingenuity, capable of producing 15 or even 20 colors at once with the same precision as in the case of the simpler machines which printed only two or three colors at once, while at the same time 600 or 700 times as many pieces were produced per day as if they had been blocked separately with the same number of workmen employed. The art has been per- fected by the highest chemical talent, as well as by the ingenuity of the mechanician and the taste of the artist. Artists or pattern designers are especially employed, whose con- stant occupation is to furnish new patterns, from which the printer selects those he judges most likely to be popular. The French artists are admitted to produce finer designs than the English, while the latter nation claims a superiority in the mechanical departments of calico printing. The preparatory operations to which the cloth is submitted before print- ing have been in part described in the arti- cles BLEACHING and CALENDERING. Printing involves numerous operations of great diver- sity, of which but a mere outline description can be here attempted. The colors employed are of two different kinds : first, those which are applied directly to the cloth by blocks or plates upon which the patterns are en- graved; such colors are prussian blue, mad- der lake, indigo, and most of the aniline or coal-tar colors. The second kind are such as are produced by the use of mordants which fix the colors in the cloth ; such are madder, cochi- neal, logwood, sumach, several mineral pig- ments, and the recently discovered dye obtained from coal tar, artificial alizarine, the mordant being sometimes applied separately, and some- times mixed with the pigment; in the latter case, as when most of the colors of the first kind are used, the goods are usually steamed. (See DYEING, and MORDANTS.) The mordants chiefly used in calico printing are those in which the acid and base are not held together with a very strong affinity, that the latter may readily unite with the fibre of the cloth, or with the sub- stance or portion of the substance which may follow. The acetates of alumina, of lime, of iron, and of lead are used, the last being the mordant for producing the chromate of lead. Alum, nitrate of alumina, and several of the salts of tin are among the substances which are used as mordants. The old method of print- ing by blocks is still practised in some parts of the process. The cloth is spread upon the surface of a smooth table covered with a blan- ket, and receives the impression of the figure, or a portion of it, by the application by hand of the block of wood, upon which the pattern is cut in relief. The surface thus printed va- ries, according to the size of the block, from 9 to 10 in. in length, and from 4 to 7 in. hi breadth. The cloth is moved along the table as fast as printed, and the colors transferred from the block dry upon it, as it is suspended in folds upon rollers. The blocks are some- times made by raising the pattern with slips of copper inserted in the wood, by which they are rendered much more durable, the frequent applications upon the long pieces of cloth soon causing the wooden blocks to lose the distinct- ness of outline of their designs. Pins in the corners serve to make small holes in the cot- ton, which mark the points for placing the block the next time. A second or third color is introduced into the pattern by using a second or third block, so engraved as to fill in the va- cancies left by the preceding. A modification of the block, called a "toby," has been con- trived, by which several colors have been ap- plied at once. A complicated machine, exhibit- ing great mechanical ingenuity, was introduced into the French printing establishments in 1834, by M. Perrot of Rouen, by which the block-printing process was rendered much more expeditious than by the ordinary hand method. It was named for its inventor the perrotine. Its construction is too complicated to admit of description. As improved in 1844, it printed variously colored patterns on white ground with the utmost delicacy, and with such economy of labor that two men could print in three colors from 1,000 to 1,500 yards of calico daily ; an amount of work which with the or- dinary block would require 25 printers and as many tearers (assistants for keeping the colors in order to be received with every impression upon the block). Copperplate printing was introduced in the works near London about the year 1770. The designs were cut in the flat plates in intaglio, and the color, applied upon the whole surface, was removed from the smooth portion, leaving it in the sunken parts. The stuff received it from these on being pressed into them by such a press as is used for printing engravings on paper. The change from these flat plates to a cylindrical form in- troduced the method called cylinder printing, the greatest improvement that has ever been