Chapter II: Part 2

The fact that the vegetable astringents form a deep or bluish black color, when combined with a salt of iron, had been known from time immemorial. Among the Romans, the _atramentum sutorium_,—“shoemaker’s ink,”—was applied to a solution of sulphate of iron employed by them, as it is even to this day, by workers in leather, to blacken the surface of that material. This it does by uniting chemically with the tannin and gallic acid, by which the hide was converted into leather, whose blackened particles are therefore essentially identical with modern ink. The “copperas-water” is to be found in every shoemaker’s shop, where it is used to color the cut edges of the heels and the rest of the soles.

As soon as the difficulty of writing with convenience and rapidity on paper, with the ancient carbonaceous ink, became manifest, the resort to the _atramentum sutorium_ as a substitute for the _atramentum scriptorium_, was a matter of course, and was but a simple adaptation of a familiar substance to a new purpose, requiring no great ingenuity, and no invention whatever.

For a time, perhaps through a period of several centuries, a mixture of the two kinds of ink was employed by the Romans; and this was undoubtedly the best composition that was ever invented for the purpose of deliberate, careful, elegant writing, designed and required to be permanent and unchangeable under constant exposure and handling,—as in the case of manuscript books before the art of printing was known. Even as early as the first century of the Christian era, in the time of Pliny the Younger, and probably long before that, a solution of sulphate of iron was commonly or frequently added to the carbonaceous and oleaginous mixture which we have described as the original writing-ink. In short, the _atramentum sutorium_ was added, in moderate quantity, to the _atramentum scriptorium_, thus constituting it a CHEMICAL as well as a MECHANICAL ink. So, modern ink may be improved in blackness, durability and beauty, and rendered unchangeable in color under the action of the chlorides, acids, &c., by the intermixture of a small quantity of the very finest carbon, in the form of an impalpable powder. But, the great difficulty is—that the carbon clogs the pen, and renders the ink too thick to flow easily, so that it can never be used for rapid or ordinary writing. We can not give, in our own words, a better account of this matter than we find in the language of a very learned author in the Edinburgh Review, (volume 48, Dec. 1828).

The article here cited is entitled “THE RECOVERY OF LOST WRITINGS,” and is nominally a review of [1]GAII INSTITUTIONUM COMMENTARII: [2]INSTITUTES DE GAIUS, RECEMMENT DECOUVERTES DANS UN PALIMPSESTE DE LA BIBLIOTHEQUE DE CHAPITRE DE VERONE. [3]JURISCONSULTI ANTE-JUSTINIANEI RELIQUIAE INEDITAE, _ex codice rescripto Bibliothecae Vaticanae_, _curante_ ANGELO MAIO, _Bibliothecae ejusdem Praefecti_. The article begins on page 348 of this volume of the Review.

We quote from page 366;—“The ink which the ancients generally used, was composed of lamp-black mixed with gum, as we are informed by Dioscorides and others, who give the receipt [recipe?] for making it. Ink of this kind may be called carbonic: it possesses the advantages of extreme blackness and durability, the writing remaining fresh so long as the substance on which it is written exists; but as it does not sink into the paper, it is liable to the great inconvenience of being easily and entirely removed; for, if a wet sponge be applied to it, the writing may be washed away, and no traces of the characters will remain. The facility with which documents might be thus obliterated, gave occasion to fraud, as an artful forger was able to remove such portions of the original writing as he might desire to get rid of, and thus profit by the absence of material words, or insert in the blanks which he had made, such interpolations as might serve his turn. Many common accidents, by which books and writings were exposed to wet, or even to damp, were also fatal, or at least highly injurious, to compositions and muniments of great value. Various expedients were therefore attempted to remedy an imperfection from which many must have suffered severely. PLINY informs us that it was usual, in his time, to mix vinegar with the ink, to make it _strike into the paper or parchment_, and that it, in some degree, answered the purpose. It should seem that vitriolic ink, such as we use at present, was also adopted soon afterwards, which possesses, in perfection, the quality that was desired of sinking instantly into the paper, so as to make it far more difficult to discharge it without destroying the texture on which it is written, and of being perfectly secure against water, by which Indian and other carbonic Inks are so easily effaced. IT IS NOT, however, EQUALLY SECURE AGAINST THE EFFECTS OF TIME; for vitriolic ink gradually fades away, becomes paler by degrees, turns brown and yellow, and is scarcely legible; and sometimes, as the parchment grows yellow and brown with age, it disappears altogether. A compound kind of ink came next into use, which united the advantages and avoided the defects of the two simple sorts. Such a mixed ink was generally used for several centuries; and with this, the manuscripts that are now most fresh and legible appear to have been written. It is evident that the ink with which the original works contained in the Palimpsest manuscripts that have been deciphered were written, was at least in part vitriolic: for the letters which had been rubbed out _were rendered legible by the application of the infusion of galls_. In order to remove the original writing, the parchments on which the mixed ink had been used were, probably, first washed to take off the carbon, and thus partially to efface the characters, and were afterwards scraped or rubbed with pumice, or some other suitable substance, to complete the process of destruction, by taking away mechanically the color that the vitriolic portion of the ink still preserved. It is but too probable that many manuscripts, the characters of which were entirely formed of the more ancient carbonic ink, have been entirely destroyed, the letters having been washed off completely, and by the same simple means as the writing of a school-boy on a slate; whilst the parchment still remains in our libraries, and is covered with more modern compositions which have sacrilegiously and too successfully usurped the place of more ancient and more valuable matter. The tirades of Cyril or of Jerome, or the tawdry eloquence of Chrysostom, are perhaps firmly established in quarters from whence [?] the Margites of Homer, or the comedies of Menander, were miserably dislodged.

“A manuscript is called Palimpsest, from the adjective παλιμψαιστος or παλιμψηστος, signifying twice rubbed; NOT as the glossary of Du Cange (_membrana iterum abrasa—charta deletilis_) would seem to denote, because the parchment had twice undergone abrasure, or the writing been twice obliterated, but because it had been twice prepared for writing, which was principally effected by rubbing it with pumice, first in the course of manufacture, after the original skin had been cured, and again by the same process, after the original writing had been taken away by washing, or in any other manner. The strict and precise sense of Palimpsest is therefore ‘twice prepared for writing;’ the repetition of such preparation being the prevailing idea in the etymology, and _not erasure_, as some have erroneously supposed. It is said to be easy to remove from modern parchment, especially if what is written be of some standing, all traces of writing, by rubbing it with pumice, or similar substances; and if the surface be afterwards polished, no one, by merely looking on it, will ever suppose that it had ever been written upon; but, if it be washed by _an infusion of galls_, the letters will be so far restored, particularly if it be suffered to remain some time in the light, that it may be copied by a patient and practiced person, who is gifted with good eyes:—so deeply had the iron entered into the soul of the parchment! If the erased letters were written in a bold large hand, the task of deciphering them will of course be less troublesome, and the results more sure. And such are the characters of the more ancient manuscripts; for, the older the manuscript, the better and more legible is the writing, as approaching more nearly to the ages of civility and refinement. The method of writing in old times is also favorable, it is said, to the restoration of works apparently obliterated. The scribe did not use a flowing ink, nor a finely pointed pen, as modern writers are wont; nor was a small quantity applied so lightly and sparingly as to dry almost as fast as it touches the paper. The ancient ink was thick with gum, and was supplied copiously by a pen with a broad point, usually made of a reed; and the characters were _painted_ rather than written, the ink rather resembling paint or varnish than our thin liquor. As they rarely wrote in books, it was not necessary that the page should dry speedily, or be dried by means of sand and blotting-paper, in order to prevent the loss of time, and that the penman might turn over the leaf immediately; the loose sheets or leaves, on the contrary, which were only to be bound up when the whole was completed, were left to dry slowly, so that the pools of ink which formed the letters, stood long on the surface of the parchment; and that part of the fluid which was of a penetrating nature was gradually absorbed, and sunk deeply into the substance of the skin, so as to preserve to us—if we be not wanting to ourselves in diligence—many precious relics of ancient lore. The restoration of the original writing in a palimpsest manuscript will be best explained by referring to one of the many kinds of sympathetic ink, which is in truth, making common ink _ex post facto_, or uniting the ingredients of which it is composed, after the fact of writing. If we write with water in which copperas has been dissolved, the letters will be invisible; but when the paper has been washed over with an infusion of galls, they will appear gradually, and will in time become tolerably legible; the ink being thus formed upon the paper, although much less perfectly, than in the ordinary maceration.”

Little or nothing can be added to the full and elaborate history of ancient and modern inks which is contained in this extract,—so thorough and complete in its analysis of the subject, and so clear in its distinct statements of the results of investigations in which some of the most acute minds of Europe have long been successfully employed, that we will not linger upon it with mere verbal criticism.

We can not present a more striking illustration of the change in the composition of inks about the time of the invention of the art of printing, than is furnished by the annexed fac-simile of a page in the BIBLIA PAUPERUM, (“Bible for poor folks,”) the oldest printed book in the world. This extraordinary book is of uncertain date. (No printed book has a date prior to 1457.) There are, as we believe, only two copies of it in America, one in the possession of JAMES LENOX, of New-York,—the other in the ASTOR LIBRARY.

The maker of this book was the unconscious inventor of the art of printing. Wood-engraving was in use for ages before it occurred to the mind of man that a letter might be as easily reproduced in that way as a picture or figure. To convey scriptural history to the minds of the common people, the wood-engravers (whose art was invented to multiply and cheapen the production of PLAYING-CARDS) made little pictures representing scenes described, and events narrated, in the Bible. For the benefit of the few who could read, it was customary to write on the margin, or at the foot, of the page on which the woodcut was printed, a few words descriptive of the subject or object delineated. This was always done with a pen, by a regular scribe, until, one day, it occurred to the wood-engraver employed on the _Biblia Pauperum_, that these words might be as easily engraved as the figures to which they referred, and of which they were the explanation. He put that idea in practice: and in an instant the sublime ART OF PRINTING was an “accomplished fact.”

The advocates of the claims of Koster, Gansefleisch, (or Gutenberg,) Faust (or Fust,) and Schoeffer, to this invention, have wasted much labor in bringing forth conflicting testimony about them. The long-forgotten and now wholly unknown wood-engraver of the _Biblia Pauperum_ had preceded them by half of a generation. Such books were in existence before A.D. 1420; and the earliest date which the Haarlaem Dutchmen set up for the first printing of their fellow-townsman, Lawrence Koster, is 1428. And his pretensions are after all very dubious. Indeed they have been generally condemned as utterly fabulous by bibliographical critics and typographical historians.

We introduce it here to show the _color_ and the (thereby indicated) composition of the INK employed. It was _writing-ink_. It contained sulphate of iron (copperas), in combination with vegetable astringent matter, and with very little carbon. The vegetable substance, imperfectly united to the mineral ingredient, has (in obedience to the laws of organic matter) been decomposed and “resolved into its original elements.” It has disappeared; but the IRON remains with its yellow stain, an imperishable memorial of that humble, nameless workman, more enduring than that which the plaintive man of Uz desired; for if those words had been “graven with an IRON PEN and lead in the rock _forever_,” that anticipated eternity might have faded of realization by the action of the rain, the frost, the dust, and innumerable imaginable atmospheric vicissitudes, or, (what is worse,) “the wrath of man.”—Some Cambyses might have demolished the rock itself, and left no more of the inscription than can now be read of those once carved on the cliffs of Edom, the God-created walls of Petra in the valley of EL GHOR.

This pale rusty WORD-STAMPING on the fragile and easily combustible paper, has outlasted the inscriptions once visible in gigantic characters on the four sides of the Memphitic pyramids; and it is only an incidental result of the intelligence diffused and the learning promoted by the invention thus begun, that we can now read the long-buried records of Nineveh, the epitaphs of the Thebaic kings, and the gravings on the precipitous fronts of the mountains which surround the ruins of Persepolis.

All writers upon this subject have strangely overlooked the fact that the art of impressing or printing letters with a metallic stamp or type on parchment, as a substitute for pen-work, is about a thousand years older than the period above specified as the date of the invention of the modern art of printing. The CODEX ARGENTEUS, (the oldest translation of the entire Bible into any European language,) is a famous book, in the Library of the University of Upsala in Sweden.

(We give the particulars of its history in our Appendix.)

This “antique” is on purple _vellum_, (which is parchment made of _calf-skin_,) and all the letters are SILVER, (whence the name Codex Argenteus, the “silver book,”) manifestly impressed on the page by a metallic stamp or type, each letter evidently being on a separate stock or handle, and applied by manual pressure. We give a specimen of this style of work. It may be called printing, but can not be denominated _manuscript_, for that is (literally) “hand-writing,” which this certainly is not.

In our Appendix may be found still earlier instances of this art as practiced by the ancient Romans on a small scale, in signatures, trade-marks, &c.

The Edinburgh review refers to Pliny and Dioscorides, as furnishing directions for the manufacture of ink. The Edinburgh reviewer says “receipts,”—not recognizing the broad distinction between a _receipt_ and a _recipe_. The former of these two words was originally intended to convey the idea that the person who signs the paper has _got_ something: the latter word, or its representative initial (℞) means simply, “_take_.”

The directions of Pliny are in the following words:—

C. Plinii Secundi Historia Naturalis.

Lib. XXXV, §25.

_ATRAMENTUM._

Atramentum quoque inter factitios erit, quanquam est et terra geminæ
originis. Aut enim salsuginis modo emanat, aut terra ipsa sulphurei
coloris ad hoc probatur. Inventi sunt pictores, qui e sepulcris
carbones infectos effoderent. Importuna haec omnia, et novitia. Fit
enim e fuligine pluribus modis, resina vel pice exustis. Propter
quod, officinas etiam aedificavere, fumum eum non emittentes.
Laudatissimum eodem modo fit e tedis. Adulteratur fornacum
balnearumque fuligine, quo ad volumina scribenda utuntur. Sunt qui
et vini faecem exsiccatam excoquant; adfirmantque, si ex bono vino
faex fuerit, Indici speciem id atramentum praebere. Polygnotus et
Micon celeberrimi pictores Athenis, e vinaceis facere: tryginon
appellant. Apelles commentus est ex ebore combusto facere, quod
elephantinum vocavit. Adportatur et Indicum, inexploratae adhuc
inventionis mihi. Fit etiam apud infectores ex flore nigro, qui
adhaerescit aheneis cortinis. Fit et e tedis ligno combusto,
tritisque in mortario carbonibus. Mira in hoc sepiarum natura: sed
ex his non fit. Omne autem atramentum sole perficitur, librarium
gummi, tectorum glutino admixto. Quod autem aceto liquefactum est,
aegre eluitur.

(TRANSLATION.)

“INK (or literally) BLACKING.—Ink also may be set down among the artificial (or compound) drugs, although it is a mineral derived from two sources. For, it is sometimes developed in the form of a saline efflorescence,—or is a real mineral of sulphureous color—chosen for this purpose. There have been painters who dug up from graves colored coals (CARBON). But all these are useless and new-fangled notions. For it is made from soot in various forms, as (for instance) of burnt rosin or pitch. For this purpose, they have built manufactories not emitting that smoke. The ink of the very best quality is made from the smoke of torches. An inferior article is made from the soot of furnaces and bath-house chimneys. There are some (manufacturers) also, who employ the dried lees of wine; and they DO say that if the lees so employed were from good wine, the quality of the ink is thereby much improved. Polygnotus and Micon, celebrated painters at Athens, made their black paint from burnt grape-vines; they gave it the name of TRYGYNON. APELLES, we are told, made HIS from burnt ivory, and called it elephantina “ivory-black.” Indigo has been recently imported,—a substance whose composition I have not yet investigated. The dyers make theirs from the dark crust that gradually accumulates on brass-kettles. Ink is made also from torches (pine-knots), and from charcoal pounded fine in mortars. “The cuttle-fish” has a remarkable quality in this respect; but the coloring-matter which it produces is not used in the manufacture of ink. All ink is improved by exposure to the sun’s rays. Book-writers’ ink has gum mixed with it,—weaver’s ink is made up with glue. Ink whose materials have been liquified by the agency of an acid is erased with great difficulty.”

This sounds very much like nonsense: but it is exactly what the “Great Naturalist,” Pliny, meant when he wrote all that _he_ knew, and probably all that was then known on the subject of ink, black paints and dyes, and very dark-colored fluids generally, which were then employed by painters, dyers, weavers, writers and physicians. To make his chapter on this subject fully intelligible to us, we must bear in mind the fact, that the great science of _Chemistry_ had no existence till many centuries after Pliny wrote. And thus, it never occurred to him that there was but one substance, (now known to be elementary,) CARBON, which gave the quality of blackness to all the materials which he names, with the exception of one salt of copper, and probably one of iron, (the sulphate,) and INDIGO, a purely vegetable substance, the dried coloring matter of a plant in India, (_Indicofera anil_,) and named by the Romans from the country that produced it, and first made it known to them.

PEDANIUS DIOSCORIDES, born in Anazarbus, (a city of Cilicia, about fifty miles from TARSUS, the birth-place of the Apostle Paul,) wrote a book on the Materia Medica, or the qualities of drugs, a little after the time when Pliny composed his Natural History. Neither of them seems to have been acquainted with the writings of the other. Apparently, they lived, wrote and died nearly or actually cotemporary, in the same empire, utterly ignorant of each other’s existence,—though they are now universally recognized as the two most eminent writers of all antiquity on the subjects of Natural History and the Materia Medica. They both lived in the reign of Nero, and the date of the active or middle part of both their lives may be reasonably placed at or about the year 100 of the Christian Era.

From Dioscorides to LINNÆUS, (in the last century,) the Materia Medica made no actual progress and received no scientific improvement; yet, eminent as is Dioscorides, he was so little known to his own generation or that next following, that it is now impossible to ascertain the exact date of his birth or of his death, or any facts in his life, but that he wrote two books, of which that here quoted is the best known, and has made him known 1700 years after his birth.

(We may mention that this Dioscorides was, in no traceable degree, related to the person of the same name, whose manuscript we have copied in our illustrations as the oldest extant specimen of Greek ink-writing.)

We give a translation of his brief but complete description of the ink used in his time, and the Latin version, that those who wish may satisfy themselves of the correctness of our rendering. It will be seen that it occurs at the close of the great work of Dioscorides:—

Atramentum, quo scribimus, e fuligine taedarum collecta conficitur.
In singulas gummi uncias ternae fuliginis unciae adjiciuntur. Fit
etiam e resinae fuligine et pictoria illa modo dicta. Hujus
fuliginis autem sumi oportet minam unam, gummi sesquilibram, taurini
glutinis et chalcanthi singulorum sesquiunciam. Idoneum est ad
septica; et confert ambustis ex aqua paullo crassius inunctum et
tamdiu dimissum, donec cicatrix obducatur, sanatis nimirum ulceribus
sponte sua excidit.

Atque jam, carissime Aree, tum pro operis modo, quem proposueramus,
tum pro materiae auxiliorumque copia, quam colligere licuit,
hucusque dicta sufficiant.

Libri quinti et ultimi de Materia Medica finis.

Pedanii Dioscoridis Anazarbei De Materia Medica.

[TRANSLATION.]

[The] “INK with which we write is composed of the soot of torches, collected.

“To each ounce of gum, add three of soot.

“It is also made of the soot of resin and of that lately called ‘painters’ black.’ Of this soot, however,—take one MINA,—of gum, half a pound,—of ox-glue and of copperas, each, half an ounce.

“It is a good application in cases of gangrene, and is useful in scalds, if a little thickened and employed as a salve, and permitted to remain until a new cuticle is formed, when it will spontaneously fall off from the healed sore.

“And now, my very dear Areas, in due proportion to the work which we had undertaken, and the quantity of the materials and contributions which we could gather, what we have thus far said must suffice.

“End of the fifth and last book on The Materia Medica.

“[The book] of Pedanius Dioscorides on the Materia Medica.”

We have followed the text of Karl Gotleib Kuhn. _Medicorum Graecorum, opera quae extant._ Leipzig, 1829.

Among the fantastic trifles with which DEAN SWIFT was accustomed to amuse his leisure, is a little string of verses on this subject which are appended, not as being of any poetic merit, but as a “curiosity of literature”—not out of place here:—

On Ink.

_I am jet black, as you may see,
The son of pitch and gloomy night;
Yet all who know me will agree
I’m dead, except I live in light._

_Sometimes in panegyric high,
Like lofty Pindar, I can soar,
And raise a virgin to the sky,
Or her to a * * * * *_

_My blood this day is very sweet,
To-morrow of a bitter juice;
Like milk, ’tis cried about the street
And so applied to different use._

_Most wondrous is my magic power:
For with one color I can paint.
I’ll make the devil a saint this hour,
Next make a devil of a saint._

_Through distant regions I can fly,
Provide me with but paper wings,
fairly show a reason why
There should be quarrels among kings._

_And, after all, you’ll think it odd,
When learned doctors will dispute,
That I should point the word of God,
And show where they can best confute._

_Let lawyers bawl and strain their throats,
’Tis I that must the lands convey,
And strip their clients to their coats,—
Nay, give their very souls away._

We find also in Pope’s epistle of Heloise to Abeillard an allusion to the power of letters, as conveying ideas, which seems appropriate in this connexion as illustrating the uses of ink.

_Heaven first taught letters for some wretch’s aid,
Some banished lover, or some captive maid:
They live, they speak, they breathe what love inspires,
Warm from the soul, and faithful to its fires;
The virgin’s wish without her fears impart,
Excuse the blush, and pour out all the heart,
Speed the soft intercourse from soul to soul,
And waft a sigh from Indus to the pole._

The genius of BYRON (in a playful flash) has illuminated our subject with one of his most brilliant passages:—

_But words are things: and a small drop of INK,
Falling like dew upon a thought, produces
That which makes thousands (perhaps millions) think._

A less distinguished poet has, in expressive, and though in quainter, humbler, yet in noble strain, said what is equally appropriate in this place:—

_Books are a part of man’s prerogative:
In formal INK, they thought and voices hold,
That we to them our solitude may give,
And make time present travel as of old._

CELSUS, who lived in this world, about the commencement of the Christian era, has left a little memorandum on this subject which is worth quoting.

We give his words entire:—

There are two kinds of bald spots occurring on the human head,—one of them a baldness which creeps over the scalp like a serpent,—the other showing itself in the form of round spaces uncovered by hair. Some recommend the use of acrid irritant articles, combined with oils, &c. But there is nothing better for you than to have the bald place shaved every day with a [very dull] razor, and, after having done that, you needn’t do anything else but rub on the place thus shaved a little _atramentum sutorium_—(“shoemakers’ ink,” “copperas-water,”)—[solution of the Di-proto sulphate of the (per) sesquoxyd of iron].

The editor of the printed copy of the edition of the works of AULUS CORNELIUS CELSUS which was printed in Padua, made a material error on this point.

The word “sutorium” (being unintelligible to the ignorant monk who superintended the printing) was changed to “scriptorium,”—that is, “writing-ink,” instead of “shoemakers’-ink.” It is well-known that a solution of copperas properly made, will remedy or prevent premature baldness; but we assert that no quantity of lamp-black and gum, or grease, will be found effectual for that purpose.

In the time of Celsus, the sulphate of iron (copperas) had not yet become an essential ingredient of writing-ink; and even after that its combination with carbonaceous and oleaginous matters entirely neutralized the power which renders it applicable and useful in such cases.

CONCLUSION.

We have thus herein attempted the fulfilment of the promise (with which we began) to produce a “HISTORY OF INK,”—a thing never before done or even proposed to be done. If not successful in our attempt, we hope that we have at least, in this little book, furnished hints and suggestions on this subject which the learned may employ hereafter when the history of this important material of history shall be undertaken and executed on a larger scale. In view of which possibility, we may, with a pardonable self-gratulation, say,—in the words of Martin Luther,—“We have given to other and higher spirits occasion to reflect.”

But we are loth to leave this subject (which has grown into our affections as we have dwelt upon it) without giving a blow or a kick to one monstrous absurdity which has prevailed among the learned, “falsely so-called,”—from the time when the Jesuits returned from China with their “edifying and curious” tales about the huge antiquity of all the arts and some of the sciences of civilization among the people of what they called the “Celestial Empire,”—a term wholly unknown to the Chinese, in any form or variation of expression.

The simple facts are that—the Chinese derived their knowledge of INK (of writing with a colored liquid) from Europe. So did they obtain their knowledge of the art of printing, carried to them by Venetian travelers, “overland,” just at the moment before the clumsy engraved wood-blocks were superseded by the moveable types of Gansefleisch or Gutenberg. So was it with the Mariner’s Compass, the manufacture of gunpowder, and all their boasted “inventions,”—among which may be included their calculation of eclipses backward through fabulous cycles of centuries, and the morals of Confucius or Kong-foo-tsee, a mythical personage unmentioned in the history of China until the contents of the New Testament had been made known there,—and _that_—many ages after the date of his supposed life and death.

But for their derivation and appropriation or theft of the great arts from the West, the Chinese and all Oriental nations, from the Euphrates to the Pacific, including the Japanese, would have remained to this day in the condition in which the Mexicans and Peruvians were found by the Spanish and Italian robbers who first explored the Western Hemisphere, and murdered its inhabitants for their land, and the fruits and the gold and silver of that land.

Whatever arts the Chinese or Japanese or Jesuits may have invented or preserved, the art of TELLING THE TRUTH is evidently, to all of them, one of “THE LOST ARTS,“—lost irretrievably and forever!

Blackwood’s Black Ink.

Davids & Co’s Limpid
Writing Fluid.—

Harrison’s Columbian Ink.

Steel-Pen Ink, Thaddeus Davids.

Maynard & Noye’s Black
Writing Ink.—

Written, Augt. 14, 1855, to test
permanence by long exposure to
Sun & Rain—

James R. Chilton, MD.
Chemist

The above is a close fac-simile of
a paper upon which I wrote with Several Kinds
of Ink, as it appeared after being exposed to
the weather for five months.

James R. Chilton, MD.
Chemist.

New York, March 15, 1856.

Snyder, Black & Sturn, 92 William St.]

DESCRIPTION OF THE PLATES.

No. 1.—A fac simile of the oldest Hieratic writing extant—about the 15th century B.C. The hawk (the emblem of Divinity) and the man stand on something that “teters”—the circle between them (a serpent biting its own tail) is the ancient symbol of eternity. The Deity overbalances the man.

No. 2.—From a Greek MS. buried at Herculaneum in the year 29 B.C.

No. 3.—Written on papyrus in Egypt; in the 3d century B.C.

No. 4.—Written on papyrus 260 years B.C.

No. 5.—Specimen of a Palimpsest copy of Cicero’s “Republic” in the Vatican Library.

No. 6.—Phœnician writing on papyrus.

No. 7.—From a Pentateuch in the Bib^{e.} Nat^{e.} Paris, A.D. 450.

No. 8.—From a Greek Copy of the Book of Genesis, written in gold on purple vellum, A.D. 400.

No. 9.—From a MS. on papyrus written in Egypt 3d century B.C.

No. 10.—From a Charter of Childebert III. A.D. 703.

No. 11.—From a Charter of Charlemagne, about A.D. 785.

No. 12.—From a Charter of the Emperor Conrad I. A.D. 988.

No. 13.—Specimen of “Roman Saxon,” A.D. 600.

No. 14.—From a Charter of Dagobert I. about A.D. 620.

No. 15.—From an early Gælic MS.

No. 16.—From a Deed of William the Conqueror.

No. 17.—The monogram signature to a Charter of Charlemagne about A.D. 785.

No. 18.—From a Charter of the reign of Hugh Capet, A.D. 988.

No. 19.—From a Deed of Henry I.

No. 20.—From a Deed of Stephen, dated A.D. 1139.

No. 21.—From a Deed of the reign of Richard I.

No. 22.—From a MS. of Wyckliffe’s translation of the Bible.

No. 23.—“Set Saxon,” A.D. 850.

“_Qui sub Pontio Pilato crucifixus est, et sepultus, tertia die resurrexit._”

No. 24.—From a Charter of Sebbi, King of the East Saxons, A.D. 664,

“_Ego Sebbi Rex East Sax(onum) pro—confirmatione Subscripsi._”

No. 25.—Part of a Charter of Alfred the Great, A.D. 800.

No. 26.—From a Charter of Edward the Confessor, A.D. 1045.

No. 27.—From a Deed of the reign of Edward I.

No. 28.—From a Deed of William the Conqueror.

No. 29.—From a Deed of the reign of Edward III.

_Edwardus Dei gratia Rex Anglias Dominus Hiberniæ, Dux Aquitaniæ, &c._

No. 30.—From the Will of William Mikelfeld, Nov. 7, 1439.

No. 31.—From a Deed of the reign of Edward IV.

No. 32.—From a Grant by William Wallace.

No. 33.—From a Deed of Richard III.

No. 34.—From a Deed of the reign of John.

No. 35.—Autograph of Lord Macaulay.

No. 36.—From a Deed of Henry VII.

No. 37.—From an English translation of the works of Chauliac, A.D. 1400.

No. 38.—From a Deed of Henry VIII.

No. 39.—From a MS. in the rounded hand of Italy, 15th century.

No. 40.—Letter from Columbus to the Viceroy of Castile, 15th century.

No. 41.—Letter of Anne of Brittany, 1514.

No. 42.—Signature of “Bayard,” the Chevalier.

No. 43.—Letter from Charles V. to Francis I.

No. 44.—Letter from Calvin, 1559.

No. 45.—Letter of the Earl of Essex, 1567.

No. 46.—Letter of Copernicus, 1473.

No. 47.—William H. Prescott.

No. 48.—Letter of Charles the XII of Sweden.

No. 49.—Rosseau, 1757.

No. 50.—Letter of Erasmus, 1476.

No. 51.—Letter of Queen Elizabeth to Henry IV of France.

No. 52.—Christina of Sweden, 1626.

No. 53.—Charles I. to his sister.

No. 54.—Oliver Cromwell, 1643.

No. 55.—Duke of Marlborough, June, 1706.

No. 56.—The Empress Catherine II. of Russia, July, 1773.

No. 57.—Washington, 6th Sept. 1788.

No. 58.—Louis XVI, June 30, 1773.

No. 59.—Robespierre.

No. 60.—Napoleon to Soult.

No. 61.—Wellington, June 19, 1815.

No. 62.—Lord Byron, Nov. 4, 1821.

No. 63.—Voltaire, July 29, 1757.

No. 64.—Edmund Burke.

No. 65.—William Pitt, March 27, 1803.

No. 66.—Wellington, April 21, 1834.

The colored engraving is an illustration of the picture writing of the Mexicans, from Lord Kingsborough’s great work. The blue border represents a series of years, distinguished by the dots. The compartment with five dots representing the fifth year of the reign, that with ten the tenth, and so on. The pictures of the acts of the Prince being connected with each special year by means of a connecting line. The additional symbols have different significations—that of the flower signifying a calamitous year, &c. In this plate King Acamapich is represented in the first and sixth year of his reign; at the top of the page are warlike instruments, signifying his preparation for war; the figures below, on the right, are the four cities—Quahnahuac, Mezquic, Cuitlhuac and Xochimilco—represented by descriptive symbols. The four heads on the left are those of the respective kings or chiefs of these cities, beheaded by Acamapich, each distinguished by the iconographic symbol by which his name was expressed in this system of writing.

These picture records, which would have illustrated the unknown
history of this continent, were destroyed in “mountain heaps” by the
first Spanish archbishop of Mexico—an act of fanatical vandalism
equalled only by the burning of the Alexandrian Library, and the
vast hoard of Moorish literature at Granada by Ximenes.

Pl. 1.

1.
[Hieratic text]

2.
...μασιν.στερον πο.αι
...ιψόμεθα ὅταν δὲ πε.
...αν καὶ δόξαν ἐ[κ] τοῦ
μαθήματος φῶσι περιγί-
νεσθαι λέγωμεν ὅτι
<π>κο<λ>ι-
νά τε προφέρονται πολ-
λ<α>ῶν ἐπιτηδευμάτων καὶ
λειπόμενα [π]λειόνων καὶ

3.
ναὶ οὐ Ἀλκμὰν ὁ ποιητὴς
οὕτως ἀπεφαίνετο οὐ-

4.
Διοσκουρίδης Δωρίωνι χαίρειν. τῆς πρὸς
Δωρίωνα ἐπιστολῆς τὸ ἀντίγραφον ὑπόκει-

_Snyder Black & Sturn 92 William St_]

Pl. 2.

5.
teterrimus
et ex hac vel

homines heretici maxime
quia non ds illam dedit
-catur; quia et legem ds dedit
-varet propter certam

6.
[Phœnician text]

7.
κῡ, καὶ προσοίσουσιν
οἱ υἱοὶ Ααρων οἱ ἱερεῖς

8.
ἐξῆλθεν δὲ
-τησιν αὐτῷ

_Snyder Black & Sturn 92 William St_]

Pl. 3.

9.
κϛʹ Ξανδικ[ο]ῦ αʹ Θῶυθ κεʹ

10.
[flourish representing “I(n) C(hristi) N(omine)”] Childeberths

11.
Et nostra indulgentia in aelimosina

12.
Et ut huĩs cõplacitationis pceptũ firmũ stabileq;

13.
abbas sirum pater

14.
quotienscumque petitionib[us]

_Snyder Black & Sturn 92 William St_]

Pl. 4.

15.
Nirsatimini curio annso

16.
W rex anglo[rum]

17.
KAROLVS

18.
in eisdem degentium orem nostre celsitudinis

19.
h. dei gra rex

20.
S rex—Anno m.cxxix

21.
Ricard di gra Rex Angl

22.
IN þe biginyng was þe wrd and þe

_Snyder Black & Sturn 92 William St_]

Pl. 5.

23.
qui sub pontio pilato crucifixus:
& sepultus tertia die resurrexit

24.
+ ego sebbi rex east sax pro

25.
dccclxxvo—Ego alfred gratia di rex hanc

26.
nomina hic caraxata sunt—EADUUEARDUS

27.
Istud starr recog est

_Snyder, Black & Sturn, 92 William St._]

Pl. 6.

28.
Will di gra rex—Sciatis me concessisse

29.
[E]dwardus dei gra Rex Angl Dominus Hibnie & Dux A

30.
This is the laste Wil ind{en}tid of me Willia Meklfeld Esquyer being

_Snyder, Black & Sturn, 92 William St._]

Pl. 7.

31.
Edwardus dei gr Rex Anglie &c

32.
Wlls Walays miles Custos regni

33.
Ricardus dei gratia Rex Anglie &c.

34.
Johannes Dei Gra Rex Angl

35.
T B Macaulay

36.
Henricus dei grā Rex Anglie & Francie

_Snyder, Black & Sturn, 92 William St._]

Pl. 8

37.
it was saide aboue in þe chapitle of

38.
Henricus octavus dei grā Angl & Francie rex

39.
fecunditatem modo celi per multra

40.
Señor

dejado nō se puede

41.
Monsieur mon bon frere

42.
Bayart

_Snyder Black & Sturn, 92 William St._]

Pl. 9.

43.
monsr mon bon frer

Charles

44.
le 22 de Decembre 1559

45.
I. Caluin

46.
singularj, qua studiosos prosequi solet

47.
W H Prescott

48.
[illegible]

_Snyder, Black & Sturn, 92 William St._]

Pl. 10.

49.
ne rentre pas dans l’ame aussi

50.
at ego nō possum omnem

51.
affection & solide Amitie

52.
Vostre approbation

53.
I cannot refuse this

54.
reade and expound the Scriptures

_Snyder Black & Sturn, 92 William St._]

Pl. 11.

55.
happy success in this

56.
J’ai lue le memoire

57.
well affected to the

58.
votre amour pour le bien public

59.
Le comite a pris toutes les mesures

60.
les anglais ont bombardé Granville
la division de bateaux canonniers ayant
à bord la 24^e légère a marché à eux

61.
Wellington
Waterloo, June 19 1815

_Snyder Black & Sturn, 92 William St._]

Pl. 12.

62.
They are very civil
about “Cain” but alarm^{ed}
at its tendency—as they

63.
faites je vous en pris le moins

64.
you have an armed Tyranny to deal with; &

65.
I conclude from your letter

66.
Wellington &c

_Snyder Black & Sturn, 92 William St._]

FORM OF THE WORD INK

IN DIFFERENT LANGUAGES

Hebrew:__

Chaldaic:__ DȲŌ

Sanskrit:__

Greek:__Μελαν (Melan)

Latin:__ATRAMEUTUM (Scriptorum)

Mediaeval Latin:__ENCANSTUM

China:__ MĬH SHWUY (liquid Ink)

" MĬH (Chinese Ink)

Canton dialect:__ MAK SHUY

Hindostan:__ KALI

Bengal:__ KALI

Shingalese:__

Burmese:__

Malayhim:__

Persia:__ SIYAHI

Sinic:__

Turkey:__ MUREKKEB

Armenia:__

Thibet:__

Anamitic:__MU^cC VIÊT

Malay:__ DAWĀT

Japan:__

Java:__ MANULYSAN

Egyptian:__

Coptic:__

Amharic:__

Algerian:__ SIMEKH

Aethiopic:__

Arabic:__ HBR, HIBR, HIBAR.

{Old French__ENQUE}
French:__ENCRE {Breton__LYOU }
{Provincal__ANCRA }
{Low Dutch }
German:__ (Tinte.) {Flamande } INK
{Hollandais}

Spanish:__TINTA

Portugese:__TINTA

Italian:__INCHIOSTRO

Piedmontese:__INCIOSTR.

Russian:__ {Lettish__BLAKKA
{Lettauish__TINTA

Polish:__INKAUST

Hungarian:__TENTA

Bunda or Argolense:__TINTA

Bohemia:__INGAUST

Basque:__CORANSIA

Illyrian:__INGOAS

Danish:__BLÆC

Swedish:__BLÄCK

Laplandish:__BLEKK

Greenlandish:__BLEK

Icelandish:__BLEK

English:__INK {Old English__ENKE, INKE, YNKE
{Anglo-Saxon__BLÆC

Welsh:__DU, ENGE

Gaelic:__DUBHADH

Irish:__ DUBH

Peruvian:__YANATULLPU

Chilian:__CHILLCAMOM

Mexican:__THLLI

Guarani:__TIV_TIRV_ (Tinta)

Caribee Islands: OÚLITI OR OÚLITACLE

* * * * * *

Transcriber's note:

Some corrections have been made to the original text, including standardizing the punctuation. Further corrections are listed below:

p. 12 unparalelled -> unparalleled

p. 26 Flenningham -> Henningham

p. 36 Dictionaire -> Dictionnaire

p. 36 pschyo -> psycho

p. 46 elogè -> éloge

p. 77 Macauley -> Macaulay

Other spelling and hyphenation inconsistencies have been retained as printed.