A review of the various processes for treatment of paper in pulp or when finished, demonstrates that time, money and study has been devoted to the production of a REAL safety paper. Some compositions and processes have in a measure been successful. It is found, however, that the ingenuity of those evil-minded persons, to the detection of whose efforts to alter the writing in documents this class of invention has more particularly been directed, finds a ready way of removing in some cases the evidence which the chemical reagent furnishes. This being true most of them have become obsolete, having entirely failed to accomplish the purposes for which they were invented.
There are but three so-called safety papers now on the market, if we exclude those possessing printed designs in fugitive colors.
It is a strange anomaly, nevertheless it is true, that 90 per cent or more of the "raised" checks, notes, or other monetary instruments which were in their original condition written on ordinary or so-called safety paper, never could have been successfully "put through" but for the gross and at times criminal negligence of their writers by the failure to adopt precautions of the very simplest kinds, and thereby avoided placing temptation in the way of many who under other circumstances would never have thought of becoming forgers.
There is no safety paper, safety ink, or mechanical appliance which will prevent the insertion of words or figures before other words or figures if a blank space be left where the forger can place them.
CHAPTER XXXII.
CURIOSA (INK AND OTHER WRITING MATERIALS).
ARTIFICIAL INK AND PAPER OWE THEIR INVENTION TO
THE WASP—PHoeNICIA, "LAND OF THE PURPLE-DYE"
—LINES, ADDRESSED TO THE PHoeNICIAN—OLDEST
EXISTING PIECE OF LITERARY COMPOSITION—WHERE
PAPYRUS STILL GROWS—DU CANGE'S LINES ON THE
STYLUS—MATERIALS USED TO PROMULGATE ANCIENT
LAWS OF GREECE—ANCIENT METHOD OF WRITING
WILLS—MATERIALS EMPLOYED IN ANCIENT HEBREW
ROLLS—ANTIQUITY OF EXISTING HEBREW WRITING
—OLDEST SPECIMEN OF GREEK WAX WRITING—
WOODEN TALLIES AS EMPLOYED IN ENGLAND—WHEN
WRITING IN GOLD CEASED—DATE OF THE FIRST DISCOVERY
OF GREEK PAPYRUS IN EGYPT—PERIODS TO
WHICH BELONG VARIOUS STYLES OF WRITING—ANECDOTE
AND POEM ABOUT THE FIRST GOLD PEN—INTERESTING
NOTES ABOUT PENS AND INK-HORNS—EMPLOYMENT
OF THE PEN AS A BADGE IN THE FOURTEENTH
CENTURY—SOME LINES BY COCKER—THE OLDEST
EXISTING WRITTEN DOCUMENTS OF RUSSIA—WHEN
SEALING WAX WAS FIRST EMPLOYED—PLINY'S
DESCRIPTION OF THE DIFFERENT KINDS OF PAPYRUS
PAPER—MODE OF PRESERVING THE ANCIENT PAPYRUS
ROLLS—SUGGESTIONS RESPECTING USES OF INK—
COMPARATIVE TABLE ABOUT COAL TAR AND ITS BY-
PRODUCTS—COMPOSITIONS OF SECRET INKS AND HOW
TO RENDER THEM VISIBLE—CHARACTER OF INK EMPLOYED
FOR MANY YEARS BY THE WASHINGTON PATENT
OFFICE—FACTS ELICITED BY HERAPATH IN THE UNROLLMENT
OF A MUMMY—LINES FROM SHAKESPEARE
AND PERSEUS—SEVENTEENTH CENTURY OBSERVATIONS
ABOUT SECRET INKS—CAUSE OF THE DESTRUCTION
OF MANY ANCIENT MSS.—METHODS TO BE EMPLOYED
IN THE RESTORATION OF SOME OLD INKS—
VARIATIONS IN THE MEANING OF WORDS—THE POUNCE
BOX PRECEDED BLOTTING PAPER—SOME OBSERVATIONS
ABOUT BLOTTING PAPER—ANECDOTE RELATING
TO DR. GALE—WHEN WAFERS WERE INTRODUCED—
PERSIAN ANECDOTE ABOUT THE DIVES—EPISODES
RESPECTING THE STYLUS—DESCRIPTION BY BELOE
OF ANCIENT PERSIC AND ARABIC MSS.—CITATION FROM
OLD BOSTON NEWSPAPER AND POEM—METHOD OF
COLLECTING RAGS IN 1807 AND SOME LINES ADDRESSED
TO THE LADIES—METHOD TO PHOTOGRAPH
COLORED INKS—POEM BY ISABELLE HOWE FISKE.
IN considering the important and kindred subjects of "gall" ink and "pulp" paper, we are not to forget the LITTLE things connected with their development and which, indeed, made their invention possible.
The gall-nut contains gallic and gallo-tannic acid, and which acids, in conjunction with an iron salt, forms the sole base of the best ink. This nut is produced by the punctures made on the young buds of branches of certain species of oak trees by the female wasp. This same busy little insect was also the first professional paper maker. She it was who taught us not only the way to change dry wood into a suitable pulp, the kind of size to be used, how to waterproof and give the paper strength, but many more marvelous details appertaining to the manufacture of paper which in their ramifications have proved of inestimable benefit and service to the human race. * * * * * * *
The Greek word "Phoenicia" means literally "the land of the purple dye," and to the Phoenicians is attributed the invention of the art of writing.