St. Landry democrat., 1893-07-01
FIFTY THOUSAND A DAY,
When and How the Crisp Bank of
England Notes Are Made.

In a picturesque Hampshire nook in
the valley of the River Test stands a
busy mill, from which is produced that
paper whose crispncss i, music to the
human ear all the world over. Since
17l9 this Lcverstokc mill has been busy
| in the manufacture of the Bank Of Eng
land note paper. and at the present time
about 80, 600 of the coveted crisp pieces
of paper are made there daily.
To a careless observer there docs not
appear to be much difference between a
Bank of England note of the present day
| and one of those which were first issued
toward the end of the seventeenth cen
tury, but when looked into it will be
found that the present note is, as re
CARDS the quality of the paper and the
excellence of the engraved writing, a
much more remarkable production.
The fact is, the Bank Of England and
| forgcrs of false notes have been running
a race-the bank to turn out a note
which deties the power of the forger to
initiate it, and those nimble- fingered and
kecn-witted gentry to keep even with
the bank.
The notes now in use are most clabor
ately manufactured bits of paper. The
paper itself is remarkable in many ways
none other has that peculiar feel of crisp
ness and toughncss, while the eye when it
has satisfied itself with the amount) may
dwell with admiration on the papers re
markab.e whteness. Its thinncSs and
transparency are guards against two once
popular modes of forgery: The washing
out of theprinting by means of turpen-
tine, and erasure with the knife.
| The wire mark, or water mark, is an,
other precaution against counterfeiting,
and is produced in the paper while it is
in state of pulp In the old manufac
| ture of bank notes this water mark was
caused by an immense number of wires
lover 2,CO0) stitched and sewn together;
now it is engraved in a steel faced die,
which is afterward hardened and is then
used as punch to stamp the pattern out
of plates of sheet brass. The shading Of
the letters of this water mark enormously
increases the difficulty of imitation.
The paper is made entirely from pieces
of new linen and cotton, and the tough
ness of it can be roughly guessed from
the fact that a single bank note will,
when unsized, support a weight of thirty
six pounds, while when sized you may
lift tifty-six pounds with it.
Few people would imagine that q
Bank of England note was not of the
same thickness all through. 1t is not,
though. The paper is thicker in the left
hand corner, to enable it to take a better
and sharper impression of the vignette
there, and it is also considerably
thicker in the dark shadows of the
centre letters, and under the figures at
| the ends.
| Counterfeit notes are invariably of only
one thickness throughout.
The printing is done from electrotypes,
the figure of Britannia being the design
of Maclise, the late Royal Academician.
Even the printing ink is of special
make, and is manufactured at the bank.
Comparing a genuine with a forged note
one observes that the print on the latter
is generally blush or brown. On the
real note it is a vclvety black.
The chief ingredients used in making
the ink arc linseed oil and the charrcd
husks and some other portions of Rhe-
nish grapes.
The notes are printed at the rate of
5000 an hour at Naplers steam press,
and the bank issues 10000 of them a
year, representing about t3OO, coo, 600
in hard cash III London Answers.