Page:The History of Ink.djvu/44

38 Of, or those used for marking fabrics of cotton, linen, &c., for the identification of ownership, it is not necessary to give any particular description. Their ordinary composition is very generally understood to be a solution of nitrate of silver, or some similar caustic, applied with a pen of proper material, to a portion of the surface of the cloth, which has been previously prepared by the absorption of a gummy or mucilaginous fluid dried upon it under pressure.

are fluids employed in coloring drawings made for parlor amusement, or the diversion of children and youth. As, for instance, a landscape drawn in ordinary colors with a wintry aspect, cloudy or sombre sky, snow on the ground, and leafless trees, if properly touched with sympathetic inks, will, at any time, when brought near a fire, or otherwise subjected to a certain degree of warmth, change to the hues of summer, the sky becoming of a clear blue, the trees in full foliage, and the turf rich with grass, each with its appropriate shade of verdure, as also flowers of their various natural colors, &c., according to the fancy of the artist, the whole disappearing as the picture grows cold. The chloride, the nitrate, the acetate, and the sulphate of