CALICO-PRINTING
CALICO-PRINTING is the process of imprinting on textile fabrics patterns of one or more colours on a white or coloured ground. Though, as the name implies, the art is directed primarily, as it is by far most extensively, to calico or cotton textures, the same methods of ornamenta tion are also employed for certain woollen, linen, and silk fabrics, and the process of printing is also applied to unwoven yarns, notably in the case of worsted yarns intended for use in the weaving of tapestry carpets. But as certain of the processes employed for printing cotton agree essentially with those used for woollen and silk fabrics, it will be unnecessary here to refer specially to any other than the methods employed in the printing of calico proper.
There is a curious passage in Pliny s Natural History (xxxv. 42), from which it is evident that calico-printing in his time (the 1st century) was understood and practised in Egypt. The following is a translation of this passage : " There exists in Egypt a wonderful method of dyeing. The white cloth is stained in various places, not with dye- stuffs, but with substances which have the property of absorbing (fixing) colours. These applications are not visible upon the cloth ; but when the pieces are dipt into a hot caldron containing the dye, they are drawn out an instant after dyed. The remarkable circumstance is. that though there be only one dye in the vat, yet different colours appear on the cloth ; nor can the colours be after wards removed. A vat which would of itself only confuse the colours on cloth previously dyed, in this way imparts several colours from a single dye-stuff, painting as it boils." It is evident enough that the substances employed to stain the cloth, as Pliny expresses it, were different mordants, which served to fix the dye upon the cloth. Thus if we suppose certain parts of a piece of cotton cloth to be impregnated with alumina, and the cloth afterwards dyed with madder, after the clearing, those parts only impregnated with the mordant would retain their red colour, while the remaining parts will continue white.
The general opinion is, that this ingenious art originated in India, and from that country made its way into Egypt. Whether this notion be well or ill founded, it is certain that calico-printing was known and executed by the Indians at a very early period. Their colours were beautiful and fast, and the varieties of pattern and the number of colours which they knew how to fix on different parts of the cloth gave to their printed calicoes a beauty and a value of no ordinary kind ; but their processes are so tedious and so clumsy that they could be put in practice only where labour was exceedingly cheap.
It was not till towards the close of the 1 7th century that calico-printing was introduced from India into Europe, having probably been practised first in Holland, to which country a knowledge of the art was carried by the Dutch East India Company. Evidence exists which shows that calico-printing was commenced in the neighbourhood of London so early as the year 167G, and there the art con tinued long to be practised. In 1738 it extended to Scotland, and took firm root in the country around Glasgow, but it was not till 1764 that it was introduced to what is now its chief centre, Lancashire. The extent of the industry in Great Britain at the present day is probably unequalled by the combined production of all other nations of the world. The other European countries where the art is prosecuted to any considerable extent are France, Switzerland, and Germany, to the last of which the annexation of the Rhine Provinces, consequent on the war of 1870-1, has added a famous centre of the industry. The art is also extensively cultivated in the United States, while Oriental communities still continue to prosecute it in their own pe culiar fashions.
In Europe the art has been in a great measure created anew. By the application of machinery, and by the light thrown on the processes by the progress of chemistry, the tedious methods of the Indians have been wonderfully simplified ; and the processes are remarkable for the rapidity with which they are now executed, and for the beauty, fastness, and variety of the colours which are applied on the surface of cotton. So great have been these improve ments, that at the present time in Manchester a piece (25 yds.) of calico can be printed in the short period of one minute; and the quantity of calicoes printed in Great Britain iu one year cannot measure less than three quarters of a million of miles, seeing the exports alone of printed cotton piece goods during the year 1874 amounted to 1,003,101,107 yards, of a value of 19,602,706, an amount exceeded by 140,000,000 yards in 1872.
Grey calico is prepared for printing by an elaborate pro cess of Bleaching, for the details of which the reader is referred to the article under that head, vol. iii. p. 811. The bleached cloth previous to printing is generally passed through a shearing machine, which removes from its surface the fine downy pile and short threads, thus prepar ing a smooth uniform surface capable of taking a sharp distinct impression from the engraved printing-blocks or rollers. The printing processes which follow are exceed ingly complex and varied, demanding for their proper execution an extended range of chemical krowledge and mechanical ingenuity ; and as commercial success depends largely on the tasteful and harmonious colouring of patterns, no little artistic ability and discrimination is required for the efficient superintendence of such works.
There are two modes of printing, namely, block-printing and machine-printing. The former has been practised from time immemorial ; the latter is a modern invention, and originated after the introduction of the art of printing into Great Britain. In the case of block-printing the figure intended to be communicated to the cloth is cut Out upon a block of sycamore, the parts which are to make the impression being left prominent, and the rest of the block cut away, just as practised for wood engravings. When the figure is too complicated, and the lines too fine, to admit of being cut in wood, it is made by means of small pieces of copper, which are very ingeniously driven into the block, and the interstices are filled up with felt.
By means of a modern invention several colours may be applied at once on the cloth by means of one block. The machine used for this purpose, which is called a " toby," consists of a box divided into several compartments filled with various colours, which are in communication through tubes with bottles filled with the same colours ; and by means of a gentle pressure the colouring fluid in each of the compartments of the machine is propelled through the felted cloth which covers each compartment. The block, being pressed against the cloth, takes the colour which is to be conveyed to the Avhite calico by the block- printer.
ing called the Perrotine, from the name of its inventor, is employed ; but it has never been introduced to any considerable extent in England. In this machine the intended figures are engraved upon a flat copper plate of
about a square yard or more in size, Upon this plate the
