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

One kind is made of a pulp tinged with a stain easily affected by chlorine, acids, or alkalis, and is made into sheets as usual.

Water marks made by wires twined among the meshes of the wire cloth on which the paper is made.

Threads embodied in the web of the paper. Colored threads systematically arranged were formerly used in England for post-office envelopes and exchequer bills.

Silken fibers mixed with the pulp or dusted upon it in process of formation, as used in the United States currency.

Tigere, 1817, treated the pulp of the paper, previous to sizing, with a solution of prussiate of potash.

Sir Win. Congreve, 1819, prepared a colored layer of pulp in combination with white layers, also by printing upon one sheet and covering it with an outer layer, either plain or water-marked.

Glynn and Appel, 1821, mixed a copper salt in the pulp and afterward added an alkali or alkaline salt to produce a copious precipitate. The pulp was then washed and made into paper and thereafter dipped in a saponaceous compound.

Stevenson, 1837, incorporated into paper a metallic base such as manganese, and a neutral compound like prussiate of potash, to protect writing from being tampered with.

Varnham, 1845, invented a paper consisting of a white sheet or surface on one or both sides of a colored sheet.

Stones, 1851. An iodide or bromide in connection with ferrocyanide of potassium and starch combined with the pulp.