The Wellington enterprise. [volume] (Wellington, Ohio) 1867-188?, 1880-03-11
From the Palm-L Leaf to the Vellum Pa.
per.


The Armenian proverb says: Only
he who can read belongs to the human
race. If this would be true, what kind
several thousand years ago; in what
miserable condition must the human
race have been, especially when we
consider the means and vehicles OF
which it then could dispose. For stone
and wax tablets, Runic wands and
leaves very naturally excluded every
possibility of general use and knowl-
edge of written characters. We do not
agree, however, with the Armenian
saying, but must acknowledge that,
with such means at disposal, the prog
ress of the human race in the ability
of reading and writing must necessari-
ly have been very slow one. If the
time of q whole century was required
to advance from the prints on yellow
ish hlotting paper, to the highly fur
nished products of the printing press
Of today how extended must have
beam the sep from tie leaves of the
palm and nut tree-upon which the
syhilline oracles and Jewish records Of
divorces were writtenAto the use; ;pt the
RtpyE16! The old Egyptim reSsred
the FepyTus (CyPerus Papyru1} rs q
''sspred plant, on account Of It's par
ticular fitness for figurxtive and writ
ten representations. They used also
its trunk for tress-work, sails, cover
ings. cords, and even for articles of
To prepare the Papyrus rolls,
strips taken from the trunk were laid
crosswise upon each other, and repeat
edly wetted with water from the Nile,
the glutinous substance of which gave
them the required firmness. gATr
e Also in India, they used to write on
palm leaves, and the inhabitants still
at present prepare so-called " writing
leaves" from the mulberry, yucca,
and agave. The best kinds of
these are manufactured at Kashmir,
Delhi and Shassa, and the widely
renowned gold and silver speckled pa
per at Lucknow. Many libraries, es-
pecially the collection of London and
Copenhagen, contain large number of
very valuable records written on palm
leaves. The most known of them is
the Birman Code" of which a copy
is found in the imperial library of Vi
emma.
A writing material common to India
and Germany, was the last or inner
bark Of the birch tree, after which an
old German heroic epic was called,
:" The Birch Song" This birch pa
per, as also the ink used to write with,
and which was composed of oil and
SCOT, possessed the great advantage of
being indestructible by water. The
ancient Indians were thereby enabled
during the prosecutions they had to
undergo from the part of the Mahom-
save their valuable birch
by submerging them in the
The Chinese-with whom the knowl-
edge of writing is much higher es-
teemed than that of speaking, and who
call the paper plant, brush, their ink
and its saucer, the I" four most precious
in the remote antiquity
on stone and metallic plates, wood,
tablets, palm leaves and barks,
until it occurred to the two herdsmen,
Luiyendshu and Honkong, to prepare
and use the skin of the reed, the bam-
boobast, for writing leaves. The Man.
DARN Tsailien rendered, however, a
much greater service, not only to his
native country, but to the whole civil
lied world, by his invention of the rag
paper in the year 95 B. c. An
immense quantity of paper is also
used in China and Japan for other
purposes. Window panes, umbrellas.
are made Of paper; paper
sliding doors, rain cloaks, made Of oiled
paper are frequently seen in Japan, and
small square pieces of paper which the
Japanese carry in their wide sleeves,
take the place of handkerchiefs. The
poorest hut in China has its paper
visiting cards a. yard in length
and colored. are in common use, and
are the bales of paper used
for fans and funeral ceremonies, since
every earthly good that . Chinese wish
es to bestow on the dead during their
stay in the other world is to be repre-
sented by paper limitations and burned
over the grave. These funeral papers
are called "Hochi," meaning resusci-
tated paper. The catalogue Of the last
world exhibition mentions several hum
dred different kinds Of paper, of which
samples had been sent from Japan.
: The art Of manufacturing paper pro-
ceeded gradually from the East to 9TH
er countries, and was by the Arabs
brought to Europe (Spain). 1t is not
exactly known when the linen paper
there took the place of cotton paper,
though some writer's mention the latter
half of the fourteenth century. From
Spain its manufacture came to France,
whittier. however, the Incrovingian
Kings had already, during the fifth
and sixth centuries, imported from
Egypt. Genoa gave paper to Andalu-
STA, and the latter paid for it with rags,
and the same exchange existed for
some time betweeen France and Hol-
land. In Italy the cities of Padua and
Treviso had then large paper manufac-
turing establishments; (HilD Italy was
behind Germany where already in the
ninth century, cotton paper had been
produced. Its greatest stimulation was
received, however, by this branch of
when the art of printing
and other graphic branches had been
invented. From that time it continu-
ally improved until Louis Robert, of
Essonne, succeeded in producing the
endless paper, an invention fully able
to supply the daily increasing demands.
Considering that the $50, 200, 900 of
inhabitants of our globe yearly
need 1,50O. 600, 600 pounds Of paper, re-
quiring not less than $3.50, 900, 600
pounds of raw material, representing a