The French process, by Vital is of Rouen

—First operation. Scouring with a soda lye, of 1° Baumé, to which there is usually added the remainder of the white preparation bath, which consists of oil and soda with water. It is then washed, wrung out, and dried. In the second operation, he states that from 25 to 30 pounds of sheep’s dung are commonly used for 100 pounds of cotton yarn. The dung is first steeped for some days in a lye of soda, of 8° to 10° B. This is afterwards diluted with about 500 pints of a weaker ley, and at the same time bruised with the hand in a copper basin whose bottom is pierced with small holes. The liquor is then poured into a vat containing 5 or 6 pounds of fat oil (Gallipoli), and the whole are well mixed. The cotton is washed in this, and the hanks of yarn are then stretched on perches in the open air, and turned from time to time, so as to make it dry equably. After receiving thus a certain degree of desiccation, it is carried into the drying house, which is heated to 50° Reaumur (144° Fahrenheit), where it loses the remainder of its moisture, which would have prevented it from combining with the other mordants which it is afterwards to receive. What is left of the bath is called avances , and is added to the following bath. Two, or even three dung baths are given to the cotton, when it is wished to have very rich colours. When the cotton has received the dung baths, care must be taken not to leave it lying in heaps for any length of time, lest it should take fire; an accident which has occasionally happened. The white bath is prepared by pouring 6 pounds of fat oil, into 50 pints of soda water, at 1° or sometimes le , according as, by a preliminary trial, the oil requires. This bath ought to be repeated two, three, or even a greater number of times, as more or le body is to be given to the colour. To what remains of the white bath, and which is also styled avances , about 100 pints of soda lye of two or three degrees are added. Through this the cotton is pa ed as usual. Formerly it was the practice to give two, or three, or even four oils. Now, two are found to be sufficient. The cotton is steeped for five or six hours in a tepid solution of soda, of 1° at most; it is set to drain, is then sprinkled with water, and at the end of an hour is washed, hank by hank, to purge it entirely from the oil. What remains of the water of degrai age, serves for the scouring or first operation. For 100 pounds of cotton, from 20 to 25 pounds of galls in sorts must be taken, which are bruised and boiled in about 100 pints of water, till they crumble easily between the fingers. The galling may be done at two operations, dividing the above quantity of galls between them, which is thought to give a richer and more uniform colour. The aluming of 100 pounds of cotton requires from twenty-five to thirty pounds of pure alum, that is, alum entirely free from ferruginous salts. The alum should be di olved without boiling, in about 100 pints of river or rain water. When the alum is di olved, there is to be poured in a solution of soda, made with the sixteenth part of the weight of the alum. A second portion of the alkaline solution must not be poured in till the effervescence caused by the first portion has entirely ceased,—and so in succe ion. The bath of saturated alum, being merely tepid, the cotton is pa ed through it, as in the gall bath, so as to impregnate it well, and it is dried with the precautions recommended above. The dyers who gall at two times, alum also twice, for like reasons. For 25 pounds of cotton, 25 pints of blood are prescribed, and 400 pints of water. Whenever the bath begins to warm, 50 pounds of madder are diffused through the bath; though sometimes the madder ing is given at two operations, by dividing the madder into two portions. The brightening bath is prepared always for 100 pounds of cotton, with from four to five pounds of rich oil, six pounds of Marseilles white soap, and 600 litres of soda water of 2° B. The rosing is given with solution of tin, mixed with soap water. The Turkey-red dye of Me rs. Monteith and Co., of Glasgow, is celebrated all over the world, and merits a brief description here. The calico is taken as it comes from the loom without bleaching, for the natural colour of the cotton wool harmonizes well with the dye about to be given; it is subjected to a fermentative steep for 24 hours, like that preliminary to bleaching, after which it is washed at the dash wheel. It is then boiled in a lye, containing about 1 pound of soda crystals for 12 pounds of cloth. The oiling proce now begins. A bath is made with 10 gallons of Gallipoli oil, 15 gallon measures of sheep’s dung not indurated; 40 gallons of solution of soda crystals, of 1·06 specific gravity; 10 gallons of solution of pearl-ash of spec. grav. 1·04; and 140 gallons of water; constituting a milk-white, soapy solution of about spec. grav. 1·022. This liquor is put into a large cylindrical vat, and constantly agitated by the rotation of wooden vanes, which are best constructed on the plan of the mashing apparatus of a brewery, but far slighter. This saponaceous compound is let off as wanted by a stopcock into the trough of a padding machine, in order to imbue every fibre of the cloth in its pa age. This impregnation is still more fully ensured by laying the padded cloth aside in wooden troughs during 16 or 18 days. The sheep’s dung has been of late years disused by many Turkey-red dyers both in England and France, but it is found to be advantageous in producing the very superior colour of the Glasgow establishment. It is supposed, also, to promote the subsequent bleaching during the exposure on the green; which is the next proce in favourable weather, but in bad weather the goods are dried over a hot-flue. The cloth is padded again with the saponaceous liquor; and again spread on the gra , or dried hard in the stove. This alternation is repeated a third time, and occasionally, even a fourth. The cloth by this time is varnished as it were with oil, and must be cleansed in a certain degree by being pa ed through a weak solution of pearl-ash, at the temperature of about 122° F. It is then squeezed by the rollers and dried. A second system of oiling now commences, with the following liquor:—10 gallons of Gallipoli oil; 30 gallons of soda crystals lye, of sp. grav. 1·06; and 10 gallons of caustic potash lye, of specific gravity 1·04, thoroughly diffused through 170 gallons of water. With this saponaceous liquor the cloth is padded as before, and then pa ed between squeezing-rollers, which return the superfluous liquor into the padding-trough. The cloth may be now laid on the gra if convenient; but at any rate it must be hard dried in the stove. These saponifying, gra ing, and drying proce es, are repeated three times; whereby the cloth becomes once more very oleaginous, and must be cleansed again by steeping in a compound lye of soda crystals and pearl-ash of the spec. grav. 1·012, at the temperature of 122°. The cloth is taken out, squeezed between rollers to save the liquor, and washed. A considerable portion of the mingled alkalis disappear in this operation, as if they entered into combination with the oil in the interior of the cotton filaments. The cloth is now hard dried.