India. Herodotus, Book i, ch. 203, tells of a certain tribe of the Caspian u In these forests certain trees are said to grow, from the leaves of which, pounded and mixed with water, the inhabi- tants make a dye, wherewith, they paint upon their clothes the figures of animals, and the figures so impressed never wash out, but last as though they had been inwoven in the cloth from the first, and wear as long as the garment” Pliny, Book xxxv, ch. 42 (ii), writes: “In Egypt they employ a very remarkable process for the coloring of tissues. After pressing the material, which is white at first, they saturate it, not with colours, but with mordants that are calculated to absorb colour. This done, the tissues, still unchanged in appearance, are plunged into a cauldron of boiling dye, and are removed the next morning fully colored. It is a singular fact, too, that, although the dye in the pan is of a uniform color, the material when taken out of it is of various colours, according to the nature of the mordants that have been respectively applied to it ) these colours, too, will never wash out.”
From Arrian we have seen that fr^oves, muslins ; and o 6 qvlcl 7 cottons ; wept^wfjuoLra, sashes, c newuraf, sashes striped with different colours ; irapfivpai, purple cloth ; and ixivSoves jaoAo^tj/at, muslins of the colour of mallows, were exported in his time from India to all the ports on the Arabian and East African coasts. The Portuguese gave the name of pintadoes to the chintzes of India when they first saw them at Calicut. Indeed the cotton tissues and stuffs of India have always been even more sought after for the beauty and brilliance of their natural dyes, than for the fineness and softness with which they are woven ; and one of .the greatest improvements in English textile manufactures would be the substitution of the rich deep-toned Indian dyes for the harsh flaring chemicals, especially of the magenta series at present in use. Mr. War die, of Leek, has paid great attention to this matter, especially in connexion with the application of dyes to the tasar silk of India*
