[CHAPTER XV.]
MOROCCO LEATHER.
Morocco leather is produced from goat-skins. Rough-haired or "blue-back" seal-skins are also used, and produce an excellent article; while an inferior description, called "French morocco," is produced from sheep-skins. The skins are unhaired by liming in the usual way, and are then baited with a mixture of dogs' dung and water. The tanning is done chiefly with sumach, at first in paddle-tumblers, and then in handlers, lasting about a month in all. Sheep-skins are usually tanned through in about 24 hours, by being sewn up into bags, grain-side outwards, and nearly filled with strong sumach infusion. A little air is then blown in, to completely distend the skin, and they are floated in a sumach bath, and kept moving by means of a paddle. After the first day's immersion, they are thrown up on a shelf, and allowed to drain; they are then again filled with sumach liquor; when this has a second time exuded through the skin, they are sufficiently tanned, and the sewing being ripped open, they are washed and scraped clean, and hung up to dry, making what are called "crust-roans." The dyeing is sometimes done by brushing on a table, grain-side upwards, but more usually the skins are folded closely down the back, flesh-side inwards, so as to protect it as much as possible from the influence of the colour, and then passed through the dye-bath, which is now generally of aniline colours. The original oriental method of manufacture for red morocco was to dye with cochineal before tanning, and this is still customary in the East, but is quite obsolete in this country. A grain or polish is given to the leather, either by boarding, or by working under small pendulum rollers, called "jiggers," which are engraved either with grooves or with an imitation of grain. A well-cleaned sumach-tanned skin is capable of being dyed in the finest shades of colour; and this branch of the manufacture of leather has been brought to great perfection.
[CHAPTER XVI.]
RUSSIA LEATHER (Ger., Juchtenleder).
This is tanned in Russia with, the bark of various species of willow, poplar and larch, either by laying away in pits, or handling in liquors, much like other light leathers, the lime being first removed by bating, either in a drench of rye- and oat-meal and salt, by dogs' dung, or by sour liquors. After tanning, the hides are again softened and cleansed by a weak drench of rye- and oat-meal. They are then shaved down, carefully sleeked and scoured out, and dried. The peculiar odour is given by saturating them with birch-bark oil, which is rubbed into the flesh-side with cloths. This oil is produced by dry distillation of the bark and twigs of the birch. The red colour is given by dyeing with Brazilwood; and the diamond-shaped marking by rolling with grooved rollers.