Forty Centuries of Ink / Or, A chronological narrative concerning ink and its backgrounds, introducing incidental observations and deductions, parallels of time and color phenomena, bibliography, chemistry, poetical effusions, citations, anecdotes and curiosa together with some evidence respecting the evanescent character of most inks of to-day and an epitome of chemico-legal ink.

by David Nunes Carvalho

Mr. Knight, who investigated this matter with care, is authority for the statement, that the papyrus stalk as seen under the microscope shows that it does not possess successive folds, but is a triangular stalk with a single envelope with a pith on the inside, which could only be divided into slices with a knife, either in stripes of a width permitted by the sides of the prism, or else shaved round and round, like the operation of cork making, and producing a long spiral shaving.

In the description which Pliny gives of the various homes of this plant in Egypt, he calls particular attention to its abundance in marshy places where the Nile overflows and stagnates: "It grows like a great bulrush from fibrous, reedy roots, and runs up in several triangular stalks to a considerable height." They possessed large tufted heads, but only the stem was fit for making into paper. After the pellicles or thin coats were removed from the stalk, they were laid upon tables two or more over each other and glued together with the muddy and glutinous water of the Nile or with fine paste made of wheat flour; after being pressed and dried they were made smooth with a ruler and then rubbed over with a glass hemisphere. The size of the paper seldom exceeded two feet.

Papyrus was also known to the Hebrews.

The Prophet Isaiah (B. C. 752) refers to this plant when he says:

"The paper reeds by the brooks, and everything sown by the brooks, shall wither, be driven away and be no more."

Which prediction seems to have been long ago fulfilled as the plant is now exceedingly rare.

The manufacture of Egyptian paper from papyrus
it is said was quite an industry in the ancient city of
Memphis more than six hundred years before the
Christian era.

The Mexicans employed for writing a paper which somewhat resembled the Egyptian papyrus. It was prepared from the aloe, called by the natives Maguey which grows wild over the tablelands of Mexico. It could be easily colored and seemed to bind to ink very closely. It could be rolled up in scrolls just like the more ancient rolls of papyrus.

The following account of an interesting discovery of a fragment of one of the "Orations of Hyperides," by Mr. Harris, the well-known Oriental scholar, is derived from the London Athenaeum:

"In the winter of 1847 Mr. Harris was sitting in his boat, under the shade of the well-known sycamore, on the western bank of the Nile, at Thebes, ready to start for Nubia, when an Arab brought him a fragment of a papyrus roll, which he ventured to open sufficiently to ascertain that it was written in the Greek language, and which he bought before proceeding further on his journey. Upon his return to Alexandria, where circumstances were more favorable to the difficult operation of unrolling a fragile papyrus, he discovered that be possessed a fragment of the oration of Hyperides against Demosthenes, in the matter of Harpalus, and also a very small fragment of another oration, the whole written in extremely legible characters, and of a form or fashion which those learned in Greek MSS. consider to be of the time of the Ptolemies. With these interesting fragments of orations of an orator so celebrated is Hyperides, of whose works nothing, is extant but a few quotations in other Greek writers, he embarked for England. Upon his arrival there he submitted the precious relics to the inspection of the Council and members of the Royal Society of Literature, who were unanimous in their judgment as to the importance and genuineness of the MSS.; and Mr. Harris immediately set to work, and with his own hand made a lithographic facsimile of each piece. Of this performance a few copies were printed and distributed among the savants of Europe,—and Mr. Harris returned to Alexandria, whence he has made more than one journey to Thebes in the hope of discovering some other portion of the volume, of which he already had a part. In the same year (1847) another English gentleman, Mr. Joseph Arden, of London, bought at Thebes a papyrus, which he likewise brought to England. Induced by the success of Mr. Harris, Mr. Arden submitted his roll to the skilful and experienced hands of Mr. Hogarth; and upon the completion of the operation of unrolling, the MSS. was discovered to be the terminating portion of the very same volume of which Mr. Harris had bought a fragment of the former part in the very same year, and probably of the very same Arabs. No doubt now existed that the volume, when entire, consisted of a collection of, or a selection from, the orations of the celebrated Athenian orator, Hyperides.