THE USE OR APPLICATION OF CERTAIN SUBSTANCES IN STIFFENING, SIZEING, OR OTHERWISE PREPARING TEXTILE FABRICS AND PAPER."
Year: 1857

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to Frederick Crace Calvert, of the City of Manchester,
in the County of Lancaster, Professor of Chemistry, for the Invention of
"THE USE OR APPLICATION OF CERTAIN SUBSTANCES IN STIFFENING, SIZEING,
OR OTHERWISE PREPARING TEXTILE FABRICS AND PAPER."
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said Frederick Crace Calvert
at the Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the
20th January 1857.
I, FREDERICK CRACE CALVERT, of the City of Manchester, in the County
of Lancaster, Professor of Chemistry, do hereby declare the nature of the said
Invention for "THE USE OR APPLICATION OF CERTAIN SUBSTANCES IN STIFFENING,
SIZEING, OR OTHERWISE PREPARING TEXTILE FABRICS AND PAPER," to be as follows:-
I take linseed, hempseed, plantain (plantago pysillium), or other seeds which
yield mucillage on being treated with either cold or hot water, and extract the
mucillage by any of the ordinary methods now in common use; or I take
vegetable matter capable of yielding pectine, and extract the pectine by boil
ing, or I procure pectic acid by treating vegetable matter with a dilute solution
of an alkali or an alkaline carbonate.
The mucillage pectine and pectic acid thus obtained I use or apply as sub-
stitutes for the ordinary stiffening, sizeing, and preparing now employed for
textile fabrics and paper.

page_text: SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent, filed
by the said Frederick Crace Calvert in the Great Seal Patent Office on
the 18th July 1857.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, FREDERICK
CRACE CALVERT, of, Manchester, in the County of Lancaster, Professor of 5
Chemistry, send greeting.
WHEREAS Her most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her Letters
Patent, bearing date the Twentieth day of January, in the year-of our Lord
One thousand eight hundred and fifty-seven, in the twenty-first year of Her
reign, did, for, Herself, Her heirs and successors, give and grant unto me, the
said Frederick Crace Calvert, Her special licence that I, the said Frederick
Crace Calvert, my executors, administrators, and assigns, or such others as I,
the said Frederick Crace Calvert, my executors, administrators, and assigns,
should at any time agree with, and no others, from time to time and at all
times thereafter during the term therein expressed, should and lawfully might
'make, use, exercise, and vend, within the United Kingdom of Great Britain
and Ireland, the Channel Islands, and Isle of Man, an Invention for
"THE USE OR APPLICATION. OF CERTAIN SUBSTANCES IN STIFFENING, SIZEING, OR
OTHERWISE PREPARING TEXTILE FABRICS AND PAPER," upon the condition (amongst
others) that I, the said Frederick Crace Calvert, by an instrument in writing
under my hand and seal, should particularly describe and ascertain the nature
of the said Invention, and in what manner, the same was to be performed, and
cause the same to be filed in the Great Seal Patent Office within six
calendar months next and immediately after the date of the said Letters
Patent.
NOW KNOW YE, that I, the said Frederick Crace Calvert, do hereby
declare the nature of my said Invention, and in what manner the same is
to be performed, to be particularly described and ascertained in and by the
following statement, that is to say:-
My Invention consists in the use and application of vegetable mucilage as
a substitute for and in the place of bone or animal size in stiffening, sizcing,
or otherwise preparing textile fabrics and paper.
It is well known that the varieties of fustian and stuff goods or paper stiffened
with bone or animal size acquire from that substance a most disagreeable
odour, and are in damp warm situations liable to undergo a putrefactive fer-
mentation, of which mildew is one of the consequences.
The object of my Invention is to substitute, therefore, for bone or animal
size other stiffening fluids not liable to undergo putrefactive fermentation, or

page_text: to communicate an unpleasant smell to the above-mentioned fustian or stuff
goods and paper. To attain this desirable end, I employ the mucilage con-
tained in flax, or linseed, hempseed, the seed of the plantago psyillium, or any
other seed which will yield mucilage. I also employ pectic acid, procured
from carrots, parsnips, or turnips, or other vegetable matter capable of yielding
pectine.
I will now discribe the method by which I extract the mucilaginous matter
from the above-named seeds and roots. I take ten gallons of water, and when
boiling add to it twenty pounds of any of the above-named seeds, I prefer,
however, linseed, and keep the mixture at that temperature for the space of
about half an hour. The mucilaginous fluid I then subject to a filtration
process to separate the solid matters. This filtration I effect through boxes,
the sides and bottoms of which are formed of wire gauze, of the requisite
number of meshes to the inch, to prevent the solid matters of the šced from
passing through with the mucilaginous fluid. To facilitate the filtration,
the mixture of seed and mucilage must be constantly stirred while on the
filter.
I prepare the pectic acid mentioned above as follows:-I grate the roots of
carrots, parsnips, turnips, or other vegetable matter capable of yielding pectic
acid, into a pulp, express the juice, and thoroughly wash the mass with pure
water; I then take fifty parts of the well-pressed mass and diffuse them in
three hundred parts of pure water, adding gradually about one part of potash
or soda; the whole is then boiled for about quarter of an hour, and filtered
while boiling hot. The potash or soda is to be next neutralised by adding its
equivalent of sulphuric or muriatic acids, and the mucilage or jelly thus
obtained is ready for use.
It will be well understood by all finishers of fustian and stuff goods and
paper makers that the fluids above described may be diluted according to the
amount of stiffening required for the class of goods to which it is intended to
apply them.
My new mucilaginous fluids may be employed in all cases where bone or
animal size is applicable, either to fustian, stuff goods, or paper.
The machine by which the above-described stiffening fluids are applied to
fustian, stuff goods, or paper, are similar to those now used for stiffening with
animal or bone size.
Having now described the nature of my said Invention, and the manner in
which the same is to be prepared, I declare that I claim as of my said Invention
the use and application of mucilaginous fluids composed of the materials and
prepared in the manner above described for stiffening fustian, stuff goods, and

page_text: paper;
I wish it, however, to be distinctly understood that I do not confine myself
to the proportions, but claim the materials mentioned above, my object being
the substitution for bone or animal size of a fluid in which putrefactive fer-
mentation will not take place, and rendering goods therefore stiffened with it
not liable to mildew, or to retain an unpleasant odour from the application of
the stiffening process.
In witness whereof, I, the said Frederick Crace Calvert, have heretofore
set my hand and seal, this Seventeenth day of July, in the year of
our Lord One thousand eight hundred and fifty-seven.
F. CRACE CALVERT. (L.S.)