The Sun.
London, England, 1856-11-28 00:00:00

SOCIETY OF ARTS.

INDIAN FIBRES, AND THEIR APPLICATION TO

PAPER-MAKING, &c.
The second ordinary meeting :of the one hundred and
third session of the Society of Arts was held on Wednes-
, day evening ; Colonel Sykes in the chair.
After the preliminary business of the reading of mi-
nutes, the election of three new candidates, and the an-
nouncement of the Noi thowram Mechanics' Institute, the
Natal Agricultural and Horticultural Society, and the
Uraking Hall-place Academy, near Halifax, having been
taken into union, Dr. Forbes Royle, F.R.S., read a paper
on " Indian fibres," being a sequel to observations on "In-
dian fibres fit for textile fabrics, or for rope and paper
making," published in the second volume of the " Journal
of Society of Arts."
Dr. ROYLE commenced by saying that India was pre-
eminently a country for fibres, and that a great mass of
valuable material, which now yearly runs to waste, rosy
be turned to profitable account. Without enumerating
the gigantic grasses, there were the plantain and the
marool, yielding white fibres, the palms and the cocoa-
nut, the jute and its congeners, the leguminous and mal-
vaceous classes of plants, and the aeclepiads and nettles,
all of which combined to afford fibres of any variety of
fineness and strength. The consequence of the suitable-
noes of these fibres to manufacturing purposes was that
their import from the East had of late years rapidly in•
creased, and at the present date the bales imported into the
United Kingdom from British India were about 600,000.
With respect to baste or barks the lecturer said that car-
riage and freight must operate against their being brought
in any large quantities from such great distances, and gave
some interesting information respecting theni. For the pur-
poses of foreign commerce, the bests from Akyab, the sea-
port of Arraoan, seemed most desirable, as they were
abundant, cheap, and easily divisible into fine, pliant, and
knot-tying fibres. The retail price of several, even when
twisted into rope, in Akyab, was one rupee per maund
(3d. a cwt.). For nearly this sum they might be put on
board ship. Various fibres had been sent from Calcutta for
31. and 41. per ton for freight. The western coast of th•
peninsula of India was favourable for the growth of bast,
and Travancore, for which Cochin was the most conve-
nient port for shipment. The bark of " antimis saccidora,"
which was common in the jungles of Canara, near Coorg,
and Travancore, contained an immense mass of fibrous
matter. The inner layer was of a white colour, and
the fibres of the several layers crossed each other, so that
one oould not but be struck with the apparent fitness of the
whole for being beaten into half stuff for papermakers.
Bast was now chiefly used for making mats, *though most
of the mats in India were made of grasses, the bulrush,
the leaves of the Kaldera bush or screw pine, the cadjon,
or dried leaves of the Palmyra tree, and split bamboos.
On the Ganges and Indian rivers the grass called " moonj a"
was employed for tar ropes, and a kind of cotton grass for
making bridges in the Himalaya, and these were good
materials for the making of twine and cordage, as were the
black "ejor," and the " pita" or " agave," commonly called
aloe. In experiments tried at Calcutta and Madras,
" pita" ropes were found to possess great strength. Pine
apple and marool fibres were also made into -rope, though
fitted for better purposes ; and Manilla hemp was now
well known to be able as a fibre to bear great strains.
Cordage could also be made of the plantain. It had
been calculated that, with appropriate machinery, in
suitable localities, the expenses of obtaining such fibres
ought not to exceed from 91. to 101., and that they might
then be landed in England from 131. to 161. per ton.
The lecturer then called attention to a fibre produced
by different plants, the brown hemp of Bombay, pro-
duced by the Ambaree or Deehana hemp, and the Tag or
Corkuna hemp. The Ambaree was much used ror ropes,
and the least troublesome to prepare, costing about nine
pie per pound (a pie being about 10.), and the Tag was
used for both ropes and mats, and cost 11 pie per pound.
The janapa from the Malabar coast, and the narvo from
the district of Canara, were also famous for the excellence
of their fibres, and might be used as substitutes for flax.
The jute, the ambaree, and other vegetable fibres were
woven in India into women's dresses, cloths, scarfs
and muslins, and were fitted for all kinds of textile
fabrics. Some of these, which were capable of being
woven into the finest muslins, were plants that required no
culture ; their stems abounded in fibres, and they were
well known and plentiful in Madras and Scinde. The
lecturer concluded by devoting a few minutes to con-
sidering the materials for paper maing, for which India,
he said, was an unworked mine, some of the plants
growing wild and luxuriant, while others were cul-
tivated. It was not a question as to what kinds of
fibres were fitted for paper—all being adapted—the best
being the plantain and banana. For the conveyance and
delivery of those fibres, in the condition of half-stuff, from
India to England, the cost per ton was, for tho inferior
kind, about 131. and 161. for the better quality.
At the close of Dr. Roylo's lecture,
Mr. RUTLEDGE addressed the meeting on the manufac-
ture of paper. He said the consumption of paper in Eng-
land was less than was in America, France, Belgium, and
Holland, and that the prices of raw material in the three
last countries was 10 per cent. beneath what it was in Eng-
land. The reason why new fibres were not taken by paper
manufacturers was because the supply was uncertain, and
when there was a scarcity, the supplier, instead of asking
from 10/. or 12/. to 161. a ton, asked 601. In the coarse of
his remarks he alluded to and described a machine that
was in the room, invented by Mr. Burke, of Montserrat,
for cleaning plants to procure fibre. Mr. Rutledge said
that it was capable of producing easily 301 b. of clean fib re
a day—it had 501 b.—and the fibre was so excellent that he
had been offered 331. a ton for it.
Mr. Warren then showed the operation of the machine
in abrading and freeing from the mucilaginous or pulpy
matter the stem of the plantain, the leaf of the agave, and
other plants, some of the experiments being eminently
successful, others less so.

A long and interesting discussion, in which Mr. Sharpe
and Mr. Ridgway joined, then ensued respecting the ma-
nufacture of paper, and the adaptability of the plantain
and other fibres for making it; after which the meeting
separated with a vote of thanks to Dr. Boyle on the motion
of the chairman.