Middlewich, Cheshire, on the 20th of June 1723, and was educated at the
Leeds Free School and at St John's College, Cambridge, where in 1747 he
became a fellow. For some time he held a curacy in Spitalfields, London,
and from 1734 to 1756 he travelled on the continent of Europe as tutor
to the young duke of Northumberland. He was then presented to the living
of Kirkby-Wiske in Yorkshire, and after exchanging it for that of
Piddletown in Dorsetshire, he removed in 1763 to Catterick in Yorkshire.
Here about 1764 he founded one of the first Sunday schools in England.
Meanwhile he had begun to entertain anti-Trinitarian views, and to be
troubled in conscience about their inconsistency with the Anglican
belief; since 1769 the intimate friendship of Joseph Priestley had
served to foster his scruples, and in 1771 he united with Francis
Blackburne, archdeacon of Cleveland (his father-in-law), John Jebb
(1736-1786), Christopher Wyvill (1740-1822) and Edmund Law (1703-1787),
bishop of Carlisle, in preparing a petition to parliament with the
prayer that clergymen of the church and graduates of the universities
might be relieved from the burden of subscribing to the thirty-nine
articles, and "restored to their undoubted rights as Protestants of
interpreting Scripture for themselves." Two hundred and fifty signatures
were obtained, but in February 1772 the House of Commons declined even
to receive the petition by a majority of 217 to 71; the adverse vote was
repeated in the following year, and in the end of 1773, seeing no
prospect of obtaining within the church the relief which his conscience
demanded, Lindsey resigned his vicarage. In April 1774 he began to
conduct Unitarian services in a room in Essex Street, Strand, London,
where first a church, and afterwards the Unitarian offices, were
established. Here he remained till 1793, when he resigned his charge in
favour of John Disney (1746-1816), who like himself had left the
established church and had become his colleague. He died on the 3rd of
November 1808.
Lindsey's chief work is _An Historical View of the State of the
Unitarian Doctrine and Worship from the Reformation to our own Times_
(1783); in it he claims, amongst others, Burnet, Tillotson, S. Clarke,
Hoadly and Sir I. Newton for the Unitarian view. His other
publications include _Apology on Resigning the Vicarage of Catterick_
(1774), and _Sequel to the Apology_ (1776); _The Book of Common Prayer
reformed according to the plan of the late Dr Samuel Clarke_ (1774);
_Dissertations on the Preface to St John's Gospel and on praying to
Jesus Christ_ (1779); _Vindiciae Priestleianae_ (1788); _Conversations
upon Christian Idolatry_ (1792); and _Conversations on the Divine
Government, showing that everything is from God, and for good to all_
(1802). Two volumes of _Sermons, with appropriate prayers annexed_,
were published posthumously in 1810; and a volume of Memoirs, by
Thomas Belsham, appeared in 1812.
LINDSTRÖM, GUSTAF (1829-1901), Swedish palaeontologist, was born at
Wisby in Gotland on the 27th of August 1829. In 1848 he entered the
university at Upsala, and in 1854 he took his doctor's degree. Having
attended a course of lectures in Stockholm by S. L. Lovén, he became
interested in the zoology of the Baltic, and published several papers on
the invertebrate fauna, and subsequently on the fishes. In 1856 he
became a school teacher, and in 1858 a master in the grammar school at
Wisby. His leisure was devoted to researches on the fossils of the
Silurian rocks of Gotland, including the corals, brachiopods,
gasteropods, pteropods, cephalopods and crustacea. He described also
remains of the fish _Cyathaspis_ from Wenlock Beds, and (with T.
Thorell) a scorpion _Palaeaphonus_ from Ludlow Beds at Wisby. He
determined the true nature of the operculated coral _Calceola_; and
while he described organic remains from other parts of northern Europe,
he worked especially at the Palaeozoic fossils of Sweden. He was awarded
the Murchison medal by the Geological Society of London in 1895. In 1876
he was appointed keeper of the fossil Invertebrata in the State Museum
at Stockholm, where he died on the 16th of May 1901.
See obituary (with portrait), by F. A. Bather, in _Geol. Mag._ (July
1901), p. 333.
LINDUS, one of the three chief cities of the island of Rhodes, before
their synoecism in the city of Rhodes. It is situated on the E. side of
the island, and has a finely placed acropolis on a precipitous hill, and
a good natural harbour just N. of it. Recent excavations have discovered
the early temple of Athena Lindia on the Acropolis, and splendid
Propylaea and a staircase, resembling those at Athens. The sculptors of
the Laocoon are among the priests of Athena Lindia, whose names are
recorded by inscriptions. Some early temples have also been found, and
inscriptions cut on the rock recording the sacrifices known as [Greek:
Boukatia]. There are also traces of a theatre and rock-cut tombs. On the
Acropolis is a castle, built by the knights in the 14th century, and
many houses in the town show work of the same date.
See RHODES; also Chr. Blinkenberg and K. F. Kinch, _Exploration arch.
de Rhodes_ (Copenhagen, 1904-1907).
LINE, a word of which the numerous meanings may be deduced from the
primary ones of thread or cord, a succession of objects in a row, a mark
or stroke, a course or route in any particular direction. The word is
derived from the Lat. _linea_, where all these meanings may be found,
but some applications are due more directly to the Fr. _ligne_. _Linea_,
in Latin, meant originally "something made of hemp or flax," hence a
cord or thread, from _linum_, flax. "Line" in English was formerly used
in the sense of flax, but the use now only survives in the technical
name for the fibres of flax when separated by heckling from the tow (see
LINEN). The ultimate origin is also seen in the verb "to line," to cover
something on the inside, originally used of the "lining" of a garment
with linen.
In mathematics several definitions of the line may be framed according
to the aspect from which it is viewed. The synthetical genesis of a line
from the notion of a point is the basis of Euclid's definition, [Greek:
grammê, de mêkos aplates] ("a line is widthless length"), and in a
subsequent definition he affirms that the boundaries of a line are
points, [Greek: grammês de perata sêmeia]. The line appears in
definition 6 as the boundary of a surface: [Greek: epiphaneias de perata
grammai] ("the boundaries of a surface are lines"). Another synthetical
definition, also treated by the ancient Greeks, but not by Euclid,
regards the line as generated by the motion of a point ([Greek: rhysis
sêmeiou]), and, in a similar manner, the "surface" was regarded as the
flux of a line, and a "solid" as the flux of a surface. Proclus adopts
this view, styling the line [Greek: archê] in respect of this capacity.
Analytical definitions, although not finding a place in the Euclidean
treatment, have advantages over the synthetical derivation. Thus the
boundaries of a solid may define a plane, the edges a line, and the
corners a point; or a section of a solid may define the surface, a
section of a surface the line, and the section of a line the "point."
The notion of dimensions follows readily from either system of
definitions. The solid extends three ways, i.e. it has length, breadth
and thickness, and is therefore three-dimensional; the surface has
breadth and length and is therefore two-dimensional; the line has only
extension and is unidimensional; and the point, having neither length,
breadth nor thickness but only position, has no dimensions.
The definition of a "straight" line is a matter of much complexity.
Euclid defines it as the line which lies evenly with respect to the
points on itself--[Greek: eutheia grammê estin hêtis ex isou tois eph
heautês sêmeiois keitai]: Plato defined it as the line having its middle
point hidden by the ends, a definition of no purpose since it only
defines the line by the path of a ray of light. Archimedes defines a
straight line as the shortest distance between two points.
A better criterion of rectilinearity is that of Simplicius, an Arabian
commentator of the 5th century: _Linea recta est quaecumque super duas
ipsius extremitates rotata non movetur de loco suo ad alium locum_ ("a
straight line is one which when rotated about its two extremities does
not change its position"). This idea was employed by Leibnitz, and most
auspiciously by Gierolamo Saccheri in 1733.
The drawing of a straight line between any two given points forms the
subject of Euclid's first postulate--[Greek: êitêsthô apo pantos sêmeiou
epi pan sêmeion eutheian grammên agagein], and the producing of a
straight line continuously in a straight line is treated in the second
postulate--[Greek: kai peperasmenên eutheian kata to suneches ep'
eutheias ekbalein].
For a detailed analysis of the geometrical notion of the line and
rectilinearity, see W. B. Frankland, _Euclid's Elements_ (1905). In
analytical geometry the right line is always representable by an
equation or equations of the first degree; thus in Cartesian
coordinates of two dimensions the equation is of the form Ax + By + C
= 0, in triangular coordinates Ax + By + Cz = 0. In three-dimensional
coordinates, the line is represented by two linear equations. (See
GEOMETRY, ANALYTICAL.) _Line geometry_ is a branch of analytical
geometry in which the line is the element, and not the point as with
ordinary analytical geometry (see GEOMETRY, LINE).
LINE ENGRAVING, on plates of copper or steel, the method of engraving
(q.v.), in which the line itself is hollowed, whereas in the woodcut
when the line is to print black it is left in relief, and only white
spaces and white lines are hollowed.
The art of line engraving has been practised from the earliest ages. The
prehistoric Aztec hatchet given to Humboldt in Mexico was just as truly
_engraved_ as a modern copper-plate which may convey a design by
Flaxman; the Aztec engraving is ruder than the European, but it is the
same art. The important discovery which made line engraving one of the
multiplying arts was the discovery how to print an incised line, which
was hit upon at last by accident, and known for some time before its
real utility was suspected. Line engraving in Europe does not owe its
origin to the woodcut, but to the chasing on goldsmiths' work. The
goldsmiths of Florence in the middle of the 15th century were in the
habit of ornamenting their works by means of engraving, after which they
filled up the hollows produced by the burin with a black enamel made of
silver, lead and sulphur, the result being that the design was rendered
much more visible by the opposition of the enamel and the metal. An
engraved design filled up in this manner was called a _niello_. Whilst a
niello was in progress the artist could not see it so well as if the
enamel were already in the lines, yet he did not like to put in the hard
enamel prematurely, as when once it was set it could not easily be got
out again. He therefore took a sulphur cast of his niello in progress,
on a matrix of fine clay, and filled up the lines in the sulphur with
lampblack, thus enabling himself to judge of the state of his engraving.
At a later period it was discovered that a proof could be taken on
damped paper by filling the engraved lines with a certain ink and wiping
it off the surface of the plate, sufficient pressure being applied to
make the paper go into the hollowed lines and fetch the ink out of them.
This was the beginning of plate printing. The niello engravers thought
it a convenient way of proving their work--the metal itself--as it saved
the trouble of the sulphur cast, but they saw no further into the
future. They went on engraving nielli just the same to ornament plate
and furniture; nor was it until the 16th century that the new method of
printing was carried out to its great and wonderful results. There are,
however, certain differences between plate-printing and block-printing
which affect the essentials of art. When paper is driven _into_ a line
so as to fetch the ink out of it, the line may be of unimaginable
fineness, it will print all the same; but when the paper is only pressed
_upon_ a raised line, the line must have some appreciable thickness; the
wood engraving, therefore, can never--except in a _tour de force_--be so
delicate as plate engraving. Again, not only does plate-printing excel
block-printing in delicacy; it excels it also in force and depth. There
never was, and there will never be, a woodcut line having the power of
a deep line in a plate, for in block-printing the line is only a
blackened surface of paper slightly impressed, whereas in plate-printing
it is a _cast_ with an additional thickness of printing ink.
The most important of the tools used in line-engraving is the burin,
which is a bar of steel with one end fixed in a handle rather like a
mushroom with one side cut away, the burin itself being shaped so that
the cutting end when sharpened takes the form of a lozenge, point
downwards. The burin acts exactly like a plough; it makes a furrow and
turns out a shaving of metal as the plough turns the soil of a field.
The burin, however, is pushed while the plough is pulled, and this
peculiar character of the burin, or graver, as a pushed instrument at
once establishes a wide separation between it and all the other
instruments employed in the arts of design, such as pencils, brushes,
pens and etching needles.
The elements of engraving with the burin upon metal will be best
understood by an example of a very simple kind, as in the engraving of
letters. The capital letter B contains in itself the rudiments of an
engraver's education. As at first drawn, before the blacks are
inserted, this letter consists of two perpendicular straight lines and
four curves, all the curves differing from each other. Suppose, then,
that the engraver has to make a B, he will scratch these lines,
reversed, very lightly with a sharp point or style. The next thing is
to cut out the blacks (not the whites, as in wood engraving), and this
would be done with two different burins. The engraver would get his
vertical black line by a powerful ploughing with the burin between his
two preparatory first lines, and then take out some copper in the
thickest parts of the two curves. This done, he would then take a
finer burin and work out the gradation from the thick line in the
midst of the curve to the thin extremities which touch the
perpendicular. When there is much gradation in a line the darker parts
of it are often gradually ploughed out by returning to it over and
over again. The hollows so produced are afterwards filled with
printing ink, just as the hollows in a niello were filled with black
enamel; the surplus printing ink is wiped from the smooth surface of
the copper, damped paper is laid upon it, and driven into the hollowed
letter by the pressure of a revolving cylinder; it fetches the ink
out, and you have your letter B in intense black upon a white ground.
When the surface of a metal plate is sufficiently polished to be used
for engraving, the slightest scratch upon it will print as a black
line, the degree of blackness being proportioned to the depth of the
scratch. An engraved plate from which visiting cards are printed is a
good example of some elementary principles of engraving. It contains
thin lines and thick ones, and a considerable variety of curves. An
elaborate line engraving, if it is a pure line engraving and nothing
else, will contain only these simple elements in different
combinations. The real line engraver is always engraving a line more
or less broad and deep in one direction or another; he has no other
business than this.
In the early Italian and early German prints, the line is used with such
perfect simplicity of purpose that the methods of the artists are as
obvious as if we saw them actually at work.
The student may soon understand the spirit and technical quality of the
earliest Italian engraving by giving his attention to a few of the
series which used erroneously to be called the "Playing Cards of
Mantegna," but which have been shown by Mr Sidney Colvin to represent "a
kind of encyclopaedia of knowledge."
The history of these engravings is obscure. They are supposed to be
Florentine; they are certainly Italian; and their technical manner is
called that of Baccio Baldini. But their style is as clear as a style
can be, as clear as the artist's conception of his art. In all these
figures the outline is the main thing, and next to that the lines which
mark the leading folds of the drapery; lines quite classical in purity
of form and severity of selection, and especially characteristic in
this, that they are always really engraver's lines, such as may
naturally be done with the burin, and they never imitate the freer line
of the pencil or etching needle. Shading is used in the greatest
moderation with thin straight strokes of the burin, that never overpower
the stronger organic lines of the design. Of chiaroscuro, in any
complete sense, there is none. The sky behind the figures is represented
by white paper, and the foreground is sometimes occupied by flat
decorative engraving, much nearer in feeling to calligraphy than to
modern painting. Sometimes there is a cast shadow, but it is not
studied, and is only used to give relief. In this early metal engraving
the lines are often crossed in the shading, whereas in the earliest
woodcuts they are not; the reason being that when lines are incised they
can as easily be crossed as not, whereas, when they are reserved, the
crossing involves much labour of a non-artistic kind. Here, then, we
have pure line-engraving with the burin, that is, the engraving of the
pure line patiently studied for its own beauty, and exhibited in an
abstract manner, with care for natural form combined with inattention to
the effects of nature. Even the forms are idealized, especially in the
cast of draperies, for the express purpose of exhibiting the line to
better advantage. Such are the characteristics of those very early
Italian engravings which were attributed erroneously to Mantegna. When
we come to Mantegna himself we find a style equally decided. Drawing and
shading were for him two entirely distinct things. He did not draw and
shade at the same time, as a modern chiaroscurist would, but he first
got his outlines and the patterns on his dresses all very accurate, and
then threw over them a veil of shading, a very peculiar kind of shading,
all the lines being straight and all the shading diagonal. This is the
primitive method, its peculiarities being due, not to a learned
self-restraint, but to a combination of natural genius with technical
inexperience, which made the early Italians at once desire and discover
the simplest and easiest methods. Whilst the Italians were shading with
straight lines the Germans had begun to use curves, and as soon as the
Italians saw good German work they tried to give to their burins
something of the German suppleness.
The characteristics of early metal engraving in Germany are seen to
perfection in Martin Schongauer and Albert Dürer, who, though with
striking differences, had many points in common. Schongauer died in
1488; whilst the date of Dürer's death is 1528. Schongauer was therefore
a whole generation before Dürer, yet not greatly inferior to him in the
use of the burin, though Dürer has a much greater reputation, due in
great measure to his singular imaginative powers. Schongauer is the
first great German engraver known by name, but he was preceded by an
unknown German master, called "the Master of 1466," who had Gothic
notions of art (in strong contrast to the classicism of Baccio Baldini),
but used the burin skilfully, conceiving of line and shade as separate
elements, yet shading with an evident desire to follow the form of the
thing shaded, and with lines in various directions. Schongauer's art is
a great stride in advance, and we find in him an evident pleasure in the
bold use of the burin. Outline and shade, in Schongauer, are not nearly
so much separated as in Baccio Baldini, and the shading, generally in
curved lines, is far more masterly than the straight shading of
Mantegna. Dürer continued Schongauer's curved shading, with increasing
manual delicacy and skill; and as he found himself able to perform feats
with the burin which amused both himself and his buyers, he over-loaded
his plates with quantities of living and inanimate objects, each of
which he finished with as much care as if it were the most important
thing in the composition. The engravers of those days had no conception
of any necessity for subordinating one part of their work to another;
they drew, like children, first one object and then another object, and
so on until the plate was furnished from top to bottom and from the left
side to the right. Here, of course, is an element of facility in
primitive art which is denied to the modern artist. In Dürer all objects
are on the same plane. In his "St Hubert" (otherwise known as "St
Eustace") of c. 1505, the stag is quietly standing on the horse's back,
with one hoof on the saddle, and the kneeling knight looks as if he were
tapping the horse on the nose. Dürer seems to have perceived the mistake
about the stag, for he put a tree between us and the animal to correct
it, but the stag is on the horse's back nevertheless. This ignorance of
the laws of effect is least visible and obtrusive in plates which have
no landscape distances, such as "The Coat of Arms with the Death's Head"
(1503) and "The Coat of Arms with the Cock" (c. 1512).
Dürer's great manual skill and close observation made him a wonderful
engraver of objects taken separately. He saw and rendered all objects;
nothing escaped him; he applied the same intensity of study to
everything. Though a thorough student of the nude--witness his Adam and
Eve (1504) and other plates--he would pay just as much attention to the
creases of a gaiter as to the development of a muscle; and though man
was his main subject, he would study dogs with equal care (see the five
dogs in the "St Hubert"), as well as pigs (see the "Prodigal Son," c.
1495); and at a time when landscape painting was unknown he studied
every clump of trees, every visible trunk and branch, nay, every
foreground plant, and each leaf of it separately. In his buildings he
saw every brick like a bricklayer, and every joint in the woodwork like
a carpenter. The immense variety of the objects which he engraved was a
training in suppleness of hand. His lines go in every direction, and are
made to render both the undulations of surfaces (see the plane in the
Melencolia, 1514) and their texture (see the granular texture of the
stones in the same print).
From Dürer we come to Italy again, through Marcantonio, who copied
Dürer, translating more than sixty of his woodcuts upon metal. It is one
of the most remarkable things in the history of art, that a man who had
trained himself by copying northern work, little removed from pure
Gothicism, should have become soon afterwards the great engraver of
Raphael, who was much pleased with his work and aided him by personal
advice. Yet, although Raphael was a painter, and Marcantonio his
interpreter, the reader is not to infer that engraving had as yet
subordinated itself to painting. Raphael himself evidently considered
engraving a distinct art, for he never once set Marcantonio to work from
a picture, but always (much more judiciously) gave him drawings, which
the engraver might interpret without going outside his own art;
consequently Marcantonio's works are always genuine engravings, and are
never pictorial. Marcantonio was an engraver of remarkable power. In him
the real pure art of line-engraving reached its maturity. He retained
much of the early Italian manner in his backgrounds, where its
simplicity gives a desirable sobriety; but his figures are boldly
modelled in curved lines, crossing each other in the darker shades, but
left single in the passages from dark to light, and breaking away in
fine dots as they approach the light itself, which is of pure white
paper. A school of engraving was thus founded by Raphael, through
Marcantonio, which cast aside the minute details of the early schools
for a broad, harmonious treatment.
The group known as the engravers of Rubens marked a new development.
Rubens understood the importance of engraving as a means of increasing
his fame and wealth, and directed Vorsterman and others. The theory of
engraving at that time was that it ought not to render accurately the
local colour of painting, which would appear wanting in harmony when
dissociated from the hues of the picture; and it was one of the
anxieties of Rubens so to direct his engravers that the result might be
a fine plate independently of what he had painted. To this end he helped
his engravers by drawings, in which he sometimes indicated what he
thought the best direction for the lines. Rubens liked Vorsterman's
work, and scarcely corrected it, a plate he especially approved being
"Susannah and the Elders," which is a learned piece of work well
modelled, and shaded everywhere on the figures and costumes with fine
curved lines, the straight line being reserved for the masonry.
Vorsterman quitted Rubens after executing fourteen important plates, and
was succeeded by Paul Pontius, then a youth of twenty, who went on
engraving from Rubens with increasing skill until the painter's death.
Boetius a Bolswert engraved from Rubens towards the close of his life,
and his brother Schelte a Bolswert engraved more than sixty compositions
of Rubens, of the most varied character, including hunting scenes and
landscapes. This brings us to the engraving of landscape as a separate
study. Rubens treated landscape in a broad comprehensive manner, and
Schelte's way of engraving it was also broad and comprehensive. The
lines are long and often undulating, the cross-hatchings bold and rather
obtrusive, for they often substitute unpleasant reticulations for the
refinement and mystery of nature, but it was a beginning, and a vigorous
beginning. The technical developments of engraving under the influence
of Rubens may be summed up briefly as follows: (1) The Italian outline
had been discarded as the chief subject of attention, and modelling had
been substituted for it; (2) broad masses had been substituted for the
minutely finished detail of the northern schools; (3) a system of light
and dark had been adopted which was not pictorial, but belonged
especially to engraving, which it rendered (in the opinion of Rubens)
more harmonious.
The history of line-engraving, from the time of Rubens to the beginning
of the 19th century, is rather that of the vigorous and energetic
application of principles already accepted than any new development.
From the two sources already indicated, the school of Raphael and the
school of Rubens, a double tradition flowed to England and France, where
it mingled and directed English and French practice. The first influence
on English line-engraving was Flemish, and came from Rubens through
Vandyck, Vorsterman, and others; but the English engravers soon
underwent French and Italian influences, for although Payne learned from
a Fleming, Faithorne studied in France under Philippe de Champagne the
painter and Robert Nanteuil the engraver. Sir Robert Strange studied in
France under Philippe Lebas, and then five years in Italy, where he
saturated his mind with Italian art. French engravers came to England as
they went to Italy, so that the art of engraving became in the 18th
century cosmopolitan. In figure-engraving the outline was less and less
insisted upon. Strange made it his study to soften and lose the outline.
Meanwhile, the great classical Renaissance school, with Gérard Audran at
its head, had carried forward the art of modelling with the burin, and
had arrived at great perfection of a sober and dignified kind. Audran
was very productive in the latter half of the 17th century, and died in
1703, after a life of severe self-direction in labour, the best external
influence he underwent being that of the painter Nicolas Poussin. He
made his work more rapid by the use of etching, but kept it entirely
subordinate to the work of the burin. One of the finest of his large
plates is "St John Baptizing," from Poussin, with groups of dignified
figures in the foreground and a background of grand classical landscape,
all executed with the most thorough knowledge according to the ideas of
that time. The influence of Claude Lorrain on the engraving of landscape
was exercised less through his etchings than his pictures, which
compelled the engravers to study delicate distinctions in the values of
light and dark. Through Woollett and Vivarès, Claude exercised an
influence on landscape engraving almost equal to that of Raphael and
Rubens on the engraving of the figure, though he did not direct his
engravers personally.
In the 19th century line-engraving received first an impulse and finally
a check. The impulse came from the growth of public wealth, the
increasing interest in art and the increase in the commerce of art,
which, by means of engraving, fostered in England mainly by John
Boydell, penetrated into the homes of the middle classes, as well as
from the growing demand for illustrated books, which gave employment to
engravers of first-rate ability. The check to line-engraving came from
the desire for cheaper and more rapid methods, a desire satisfied in
various ways, but especially by etching and by the various kinds of
photography. Nevertheless, the 19th century produced most highly
accomplished work in line-engraving, both in the figure and in
landscape. Its characteristics, in comparison with the work of other
centuries, were chiefly a more thorough and delicate rendering of local
colour, light and shade, and texture. The elder engravers could draw as
correctly as the moderns, but they either neglected these elements or
admitted them sparingly, as opposed to the spirit of their art. In a
modern engraving from Landseer may be seen the blackness of a man's
boots (local colour), the soft roughness of his coat (texture), and the
exact value in light and dark of his face and costume against the cloudy
sky. Nay more, there is to be found every sparkle on bit, boot and
stirrup. Modern painting pays more attention to texture and chiaroscuro
than classical painting did, and engraving necessarily followed in the
same directions. But there is a certain sameness in pure line-engraving
more favourable to some forms and textures than to others. This sameness
of line-engraving, and its costliness, led to the adoption of mixed
methods, extremely prevalent in commercial prints from popular artists.
In the well-known prints from Rosa Bonheur, for example, by T. Landseer,
H. T. Ryall, and C. G. Lewis, the tone of the skies is got by
machine-ruling, and so is much undertone in the landscape; the fur of
the animals is all etched, and so are the foreground plants, the real
burin work being used sparingly where most favourable to texture. Even
in the exquisite engravings after Turner, by Cooke, Goodall, Wallis,
Miller, Willmore, and others, who reached a degree of delicacy in light
and shade far surpassing the work of the old masters, the engravers had
recourse to etching, finishing with the burin and dry point. Turner's
name may be added to those of Raphael, Rubens and Claude in the list of
painters who have had a special influence upon engraving. The speciality
of Turner's influence was in the direction of delicacy of tone. In this
respect the Turner vignettes to Roger's poems were a high-water mark of
human attainment, not likely ever to be surpassed.
The record of the art of line-engraving during the last quarter of the
19th century is one of continued decay. Technical improvements, it was
hoped, might save the art; it was thought by some that the slight revival
resultant on the turning back of the burin's cutting-point--whereby the
operator pulled the tool towards him instead of pushing it from
him--might effect much, in virtue of the time and labour saved by the
device. But by the beginning of the 20th century pictorial line-engraving
in England was practically non-existent, and, with the passing of Jeens
and Stacpoole, the spasmodic demand by publishers for engravers to
engrave new plates remained unanswered. Mr C. W. Sherborn, the exquisite
and facile designer and engraver of book-plates, has scarcely been
surpassed in his own line, but his art is mainly heraldic. There are now
no men capable of such work as that with which Doo, J. H. Robinson, and
their fellows maintained the credit of the English School. Line-engraving
has been killed by etching, mezzotint and the "mixed method." The
disappearance of the art is due not so much to the artistic objection
that the personality of the line-engraver stands obtrusively between the
painter and the public; it is rather that the public refuse to wait for
several years for the proofs for which they have subscribed, when by
another method they can obtain their plates more quickly. An important
line plate may occupy a prodigious time in the engraving; J. H.
Robinson's "Napoleon and the Pope" took about twelve years. The invention
of steel-facing a copper plate would now enable the engraver to proceed
more expeditiously; but even in this case he can no more compete with the
etcher than the mezzotint-engraver can keep pace with the photogravure
manufacturer.
The Art Union of London in the past gave what encouragement it could;
but with the death of J. Stephenson (1886) and F. Bacon (1887) it was
evident that all hope was gone. John Saddler at the end was driven, in
spite of his capacity to do original work, to spend most of his time in
assisting Thomas Landseer to rule the skies on his plates, simply
because there was not enough line-engraving to do. Since then there was
some promise of a revival, and Mr Bourne engraved a few of the pictures
by Gustave Doré. But little followed. The last of the line-engravers of
Turner's pictures died in the person of Sir Daniel Wilson (d. 1892),
who, recognizing the hopelessness of his early profession, laid his
graver aside, and left Europe for Canada and eventually became president
of the university of Toronto.
If line-engraving still flourishes in France, it is due not a little to
official encouragement and to intelligent fostering by collectors and
connoisseurs. The prizes offered by the École des Beaux Arts would
probably not suffice to give vitality to the art but for the employment
afforded to the finished artist by the "Chalcographie du Musée du
Louvre," in the name of which commissions are judiciously distributed.
At the same time, it must be recognized that not only are French
engravers less busy than they were in days when line-engraving was the
only "important" method of picture-translation, but they work for the
most part for much smaller rewards. Moreover, the class of the work has
entirely changed, partly through the reduction of prices paid for it,
partly through the change of taste and fashion, and partly, again,
through the necessities of the situation. That is to say, that public
impatience is but a partial factor in the abandonment of the fine broad
sweeping trough cut deep into the copper which was characteristic of the
earlier engraving, either simply cut or crossed diagonally so as to form
the series of "lozenges" typical of engraving at its finest and grandest
period. That method was slow; but scarcely less slow was the shallower
work rendered possible by the steel plate by reason of the much greater
degree of elaboration of which such plates were capable, and which the
public was taught--mainly by Finden--to expect. The French engravers
were therefore driven at last to simplify their work if they were to
satisfy the public and live by the burin. To compensate for loss of
colour, the art developed in the direction of elegance and refinement.
Gaillard (d. 1887), Blanchard, and Alphonse François (d. 1888) were
perhaps the earliest chiefs of the new school, the characteristics of
which are the substitution of exquisite greys for the rich blacks of
old, simplicity of method being often allied to extremely high
elaboration. Yet the aim of the modern engraver has always been, while
pushing the capability of his own art to the farthermost limit, to
retain throughout the individual and personal qualities of the master
whose work is translated on the plate. The height of perfection to which
the art is reached is seen in the triptych of Mantegna by Achille
Jacquet (d. 1909), to whom may perhaps be accorded the first place among
several engravers of the front rank. This "Passion" (from the three
pictures in the Louvre and at Tours, forming the predella of the San
Zeno altarpiece in Verona) not only conveys the forms, sentiment, and
colour of the master, but succeeds also in rendering the peculiar
luminosity of the originals. Jacquet, who gained the _Prix de Rome_ in
1870, also translated pictures of Sir Joshua Reynolds, and engraved fine
plates after Paul Dubois, Cabanel, Bouguereau, Meissonier and Detaille.
The freedom of much of his work suggests an affinity with etching and
dry-point; indeed, it appears that he uses the etching-needle and acid
to lay in some of his groundwork and outlines. Léopold Flameng's
engraving after Jan van Eyck's "Virgin with the Donor," in the Louvre,
is one of the most admirable works of its kind, retaining the quality
and sentiment of the master, extreme minuteness and elaboration
notwithstanding. Jules Jacquet is known for his work after Meissonier
(especially the "Friedland") and after Bonnat; Adrien Didier for his
plates after Holbein ("Anne of Cleves"), Raphael, and Paul Veronese,
among the Old Masters, and Bonnat, Bouguereau, and Roybet among the new.
Jazinski (Botticelli's "Primavera"), Sulpis (Mantegna and Gustave
Moreau), Patricot (Gustave Moreau), Burney, and Champollion (d. 1901),
have been among the leaders of the modern school. Their object is to
secure the faithful transcript of the painter they reproduce, while
readily sacrificing the power of the old method, which, whatever its
force and its beauty, was easily acquired by mediocre artists of
technical ability who were nevertheless unable to appreciate or
reproduce anything beyond mechanical excellence.
The Belgian School of engraving is not without vitality. Gustave Biot
was equally skilful in portraiture and subject (engraving after Gallait,
Cabanel, Gustave Doré, among his best work); A. M. Danse executed plates
after leading painters, and elaborated an effective "mixed method" of
graver-work and dry-point; and de Meerman has engraved a number of good
plates; but private patronage is hardly sufficient in Belgium to
maintain the school in a state of prosperous efficiency.
In Germany, as might be expected, line-engraving retains not a little of
its popularity in its more orthodox form. The novel Stauffer-Bern
method, in which freedom and lightness are obtained with such delicacy
that the fine lines, employed in great numbers, run into tone, and yield
a supposed advantage in modelling, has not been without appreciation.
But the more usual virtue of the graver has been best supported, and
many have worked in the old-fashioned manner. Friedrich Zimmermann (d.
1887) began his career by engraving such prints as Guido Reni's "Ecce
Homo" in Dresden, and then devoted himself to the translation of modern
German painters. Rudolph Pfnor was an ornamentist representative of his
class; and Joseph Kohlschein, of Düsseldorf, a typical exponent of the
intelligent conservative manner. His "Marriage at Cana" after Paul
Veronese, "The Sistine Madonna" after Raphael, and "St Cecilia" after
the same master, are all plates of a high order.
In Italy the art is well-nigh as moribund as in England. When Vittorio
Pica (of Naples) and Conconi (of Milan) have been named, it is difficult
to mention other successors to the fine school of the 19th century which
followed Piranesi and Volpato. A few of the pupils of Rosaspina and
Paolo Toschi lived into the last quarter of the century, but to the
present generation Asiolo, Jesi, C. Raimondi, L. Bigola, and Antonio
Isac are remembered rather for their efforts than for their success in
supporting their art against the combined opposition of etching,
"process" and public indifference.
Outside Europe line-engraving can no longer be said to exist. Here and
there a spasmodic attempt may be made to appeal to the artistic
appreciation of a limited public; but no general attention is paid to
such efforts, nor, it may be added, are these inherently worthy of much
notice. There are still a few who can engrave a head from a photograph
or drawing, or a small engraving for book-illustration or for
book-plates; there are more who are highly proficient in mechanical
engraving for decorative purposes; but the engraving-machine is fast
superseding this class. In short, the art of worthily translating a fine
painting beyond the borders of France, Belgium, Germany and perhaps
Italy can scarcely be said to survive, and even in those countries it
appears to exist on sufferance and by hot-house encouragement.
AUTHORITIES.--P. G. Hamerton, _Drawing and Engraving_ (Edinburgh,
1892); H. W. Singer and W. Strang, _Etching, Engraving, and other
methods of Printing Pictures_ (London, 1897); A. de Lostalot, _Les
Procédés de la gravure_ (Paris, 1882); Le Comte Henri Delaborde, La
Gravure (Paris, English trans., with a chapter on English engraving
methods, by William Walker, London, 1886); H. W. Singer, _Geschichte
des Kupferstichs_ (Magdeburg and Leipzig, 1895), and _Der Kupferstich_
(Bielefeld and Leipzig, 1904); Alex. Waldow, _Illustrirte Encyklopädie
der Graphischen Künste_ (Leipzig, 1881-1884); Lippmann, _Engraving and
Engraving_, translated by Martin Hardie (London, 1906); and for those
who desire books of gossip on the subject, Arthur Hayden, _Chats on
Old Prints_ (London, 1906), and Malcolm C. Salaman, _The Old Engravers
of England_ (London, 1906). (P. G. H.; M. H. S.)
LINEN and LINEN MANUFACTURES. Under the name of linen are comprehended
all yarns spun and fabrics woven from flax fibre (see FLAX).
From the earliest periods of human history till almost the close of the
18th century the linen manufacture was one of the most extensive and
widely disseminated of the domestic industries of European countries.
The industry was most largely developed in Russia, Austria, Germany,
Holland, Belgium, the northern provinces of France, and certain parts of
England, in the north of Ireland, and throughout Scotland; and in these
countries its importance was generally recognized by the enactment of
special laws, having for their object the protection and extension of
the trade. The inventions of Arkwright, Hargreaves and Crompton in the
later part of the 18th century, benefiting almost exclusively the art of
cotton-spinning, and the unparalleled development of that branch of
textile manufactures, largely due to the ingenuity of these inventors,
gave the linen trade as it then existed a fatal blow. Domestic spinning,
and with it hand-loom weaving, immediately began to shrink; the trade
which had supported whole villages and provinces entirely disappeared,
and the linen manufacture, in attenuated dimensions and changed
conditions, took refuge in special localities, where it resisted, not
unsuccessfully, the further assaults of cotton, and, with varying
fortunes, rearranged its relations in the community of textile
industries. The linen industries of the United Kingdom were the first to
suffer from the aggression of cotton; more slowly the influence of the
rival textile reached other countries.
In 1810 Napoleon I. offered a reward of one million francs to any
inventor who should devise the best machinery for the spinning of flax
yarn. Within a few weeks thereafter Philippe de Girard patented in
France important inventions for flax spinning by both dry and wet
methods. His inventions, however, did not receive the promised reward
and were neglected in his native country. In 1815 he was invited by the
Austrian government to establish a spinning mill at Hirtenberg near
Vienna, which was run with his machinery for a number of years, but it
failed to prove a commercial success. In the meantime English inventors
had applied themselves to the task of adapting machines to the
preparation and spinning of flax. The foundation of machine spinning of
flax was laid by John Kendrew and Thomas Porthouse of Darlington, who,
in 1787, secured a patent for "a mill or machine upon new principles for
spinning yarn from hemp, tow, flax or wool." By innumerable successive
improvements and modifications, the invention of Kendrew and Porthouse
developed into the perfect system of machinery with which, at the
present day, spinning-mills are furnished; but progress in adapting flax
fibres for mechanical spinning, and linen yarn for weaving cloth by
power-loom was much slower than in the corresponding case of cotton.
Till comparatively recent times, the sole spinning implements were the
spindle and distaff. The spindle, which is the fundamental apparatus in
all spinning machinery, was a round stick or rod of wood about 12 in. in
length, tapering towards each extremity, and having at its upper end a
notch or slit into which the yarn might be caught or fixed. In general,
a ring or "whorl" of stone or clay was passed round the upper part of
the spindle to give it momentum and steadiness when in rotation, while
in some few cases an ordinary potato served the purpose of a whorl. The
distaff, or rock, was a rather longer and stronger bar or stick, around
one end of which, in a loose coil or ball, the fibrous material to be
spun was wound. The other extremity of the distaff was carried under the
left arm, or fixed in the girdle at the left side, so as to have the
coil of flax in a convenient position for drawing out to form the yarn.
A prepared end of yarn being fixed into the notch, the spinster, by a
smart rolling motion of the spindle with the right hand against the
right leg, threw it out from her, spinning in the air, while, with the
left hand, she drew from the rock an additional supply of fibre which
was formed into a uniform and equal strand with the right. The yarn
being sufficiently twisted was released from the notch, wound around the
lower part of the spindle, and again fixed in the notch at the point
insufficiently twisted; and so the rotating, twisting and drawing out
operations went on till the spindle was full. So persistent is an
ancient and primitive art of this description that in remote districts
of Scotland--a country where machine spinning has attained a high
standard--spinning with rock and spindle is still practised;[1] and yarn
of extraordinary delicacy, beauty and tenacity has been spun by their
agency. The first improvement on the primitive spindle was found in the
construction of the hand-wheel, in which the spindle, mounted in a
frame, was fixed horizontally, and rotated by a band passing round it
and a large wheel, set in the same framework. Such a wheel became known
in Europe about the middle of the 16th century, but it appears to have
been in use for cotton spinning in the East from time immemorial. At a
later date, which cannot be fixed, the treadle motion was attached to
the spinning wheel, enabling the spinster to sit at work with both hands
free; and the introduction of the two-handed or double-spindle wheel,
with flyers or twisting arms on the spindles, completed the series of
mechanical improvements effected on flax spinning till the end of the
18th century. The common use of the two-handed wheel throughout the
rural districts of Ireland and Scotland is a matter still within the
recollection of some people; but spinning wheels are now seldom seen.
The modern manufacture of linen divides itself into two branches,
spinning and weaving, to which may be added the bleaching and various
finishing processes, which, in the case of many linen textures, are
laborious undertakings and important branches of industry. The flax
fibre is received in bundles from the scutch mill, and after having been
classed into various grades, according to the quality of the material,
it is labelled and placed in the store ready for the flax mill. The
whole operations in yarn manufacture comprise (1) hackling, (2)
preparing and (3) spinning.
_Hackling._--This first preparatory process consists not only in
combing out, disentangling and laying smooth and parallel the separate
fibres, but also serves to split up and separate into their ultimate
filaments the strands of fibre which, up to this point, have been
agglutinated together. The hackling process was originally performed
by hand, and it was one of fundamental importance, requiring the
exercise of much dexterity and judgment. The broken, ravelled and
short fibres, which separate out in the hackling process, form tow, an
article of much inferior value to the spinner. A good deal of
hand-hackling is still practised, especially in Irish and continental
mills; and it has not been found practicable, in any case, to dispense
entirely with a rough preparation of the fibre by hand labour. In
hackling by hand, the hackler takes a handful or "strick" of rough
flax, winds the top end around his hands, and then, spreading out the
root end as broad and flat as possible, by a swinging motion dashes
the fibre into the hackle teeth or needles of the rougher or "ruffer."
The rougher is a board plated with tin, and studded with spikes or
teeth of steel about 7 in. in length, which taper to a fine sharp
point. The hackler draws his strick several times through this tool,
working gradually up from the roots to near his hand, till in his
judgment the fibres at the root end are sufficiently combed out and
smoothed. He then seizes the root end and similarly treats the top end
of the strick. The same process is again repeated on a similar tool,
the teeth of which are 5 in. long, and much more closely studded
together; and for the finer counts of yarn a third and a fourth hackle
may be used, of still increasing fineness and closeness of teeth. In
dealing with certain varieties of the fibre, for fine spinning
especially, the flax is, after roughing, broken or cut into three
lengths--the top, middle and root ends. Of these the middle cut is
most valuable, being uniform in length, strength and quality. The root
end is more woody and harsh, while the top, though fine in quality, is
uneven and variable in strength. From some flax of extra length it is
possible to take two short middle cuts; and, again, the fibre is
occasionally only broken into two cuts. Flax so prepared is known as
"cut line" in contradistinction to "long line" flax, which is the
fibre unbroken. The subsequent treatment of line, whether long or cut,
does not present sufficient variation to require further reference to
these distinctions.
In the case of hackling by machinery, the flax is first roughed and
arranged in stricks, as above described under hand hackling. In the
construction of hackling machines, the general principles of those now
most commonly adopted are identical. The machines are known as
vertical sheet hackling machines, their essential features being a set
of endless leather bands or sheets revolving over a pair of rollers in
a vertical direction. These sheets are crossed by iron bars, to which
hackle stocks, furnished with teeth, are screwed. The hackle stocks on
each separate sheet are of one size and gauge, but each successive
sheet in the length of the machine is furnished with stocks of
increasing fineness, so that the hackling tool at the end where the
flax is entered is the coarsest, say about four pins per inch, while
that to which the fibre is last submitted has the smallest and most
closely set teeth. The finest tools may contain from 45 to 60 pins per
inch. Thus the whole of the endless vertical revolving sheet presents
a continuous series of hackle teeth, and the machines are furnished
with a double set of such sheets revolving face to face, so close
together that the pins of one set of sheets intersect those on the
opposite stocks. Overhead, and exactly centred between these revolving
sheets, is the head or holder channel, from which the flax hangs down
while it is undergoing the hackling process on both sides. The flax is
fastened in a holder consisting of two heavy flat plates of iron,
between which it is spread and tightly screwed up. The holder is 11
in. in length, and the holder channel is fitted to contain a line of
six, eight or twelve such holders, according to the number of separate
bands of hackling stocks in the machine. The head or holder channel
has a falling and rising motion, by which it first presents the ends
and gradually more and more of the length of the fibre to the hackle
teeth, and, after dipping down the full length of the fibre exposed,
it slowly rises and lifts the flax clear of the hackle stocks. By a
reciprocal motion all the holders are then moved forward one length;
that at the last and finest set of stocks is thrown out, and place is
made for filling in an additional holder at the beginning of the
series. Thus with a six-tool hackle, or set of stocks, each holder
full of flax from beginning to end descends into and rises from the
hackle teeth six times in travelling from end to end of the machine.
The root ends being thus first hackled, the holders are shot back
along an inclined plane, the iron plates unclamped, the flax reversed,
and the top ends are then submitted to the same hackling operation.
The tow made during the hackling process is carried down by the pins
of the sheet, and is stripped from them by means of a circular brush
placed immediately under the bottom roller. The brush revolves in the
same direction as, but quicker than the sheet, consequently the tow is
withdrawn from the pins. The tow is then removed from the brush by a
doffer roller, from which it is finally removed by a doffing knife.
This material is then carded by a machine similar to, but finer than,
the one described under Jute (q.v.). The hackled flax, however, is
taken direct to the preparing department.
_Preparing._--The various operations in this stage have for their
object the proper assortment of dressed line into qualities fit for
spinning, and the drawing out of the fibres to a perfectly level and
uniform continuous ribbon or sliver, containing throughout an equal
quantity of fibre in any given length. From the hackling the now
smooth, glossy and clean stricks are taken to the sorting room, where
they are assorted into different qualities by the "line sorter," who
judges by both eye and touch the quality and capabilities of the
fibre. So sorted, the material is passed to the spreading and drawing
frames, a series or system of machines all similar in construction and
effect. The essential features of the spreading frame are: (1) the
feeding cloth or creeping sheet, which delivers the flax to (2) a pair
of "feed and jockey" rollers, which pass it on (3) to the gill frame
or fallers. The gill frame consists of a series of narrow hackle bars,
with short closely studded teeth, which travel between the feed
rollers and the drawing or "boss and pressing" rollers to be
immediately attended to. They are, by an endless screw arrangement,
carried forward at approximately the same rate at which the flax is
delivered to them, and when they reach the end of their course they
fall under, and by a similar screw arrangement are brought back to the
starting-point; and thus they form an endless moving level toothed
platform for carrying away the flax from the feed rollers. This is the
machine in which the fibres are, for the first time, formed into a
continuous length termed a sliver. In order to form this continuous
sliver it is necessary that the short lengths of flax should overlap
each other on the spread sheet or creeping sheet. This sheet contains
four or six divisions, so that four or six lots of overlapped flax are
moving at the same time towards the first pair of rollers--the boss
rollers or retaining rollers. The fibre passes between these rollers
and is immediately caught by the rising gills which carry the fibre
towards the drawing rollers. The pins of the gills should pass through
the fibre so that they may have complete control over it, while their
speed should be a little greater than the surface speed of the
retaining rollers. The fibre is thus carried forward to the drawing
rollers, which have a surface speed of from 10 to 30 times that of the
retaining rollers. The great difference between the speeds of the
retaining and drawing rollers results in each sliver being drawn out
to a corresponding degree. Finally all the slivers are run into one
and in this state are passed between the delivery rollers into the
sliver cans. Each can should contain the same length of sliver, a
common length being 1000 yds. A bell is automatically rung by the
machine to warn the attendant that the desired length has been
deposited into the can. From the spreading frame the cans of sliver
pass to the drawing frames, where from four to twelve slivers combined
are passed through feed rollers over gills, and drawn out by drawing
rollers to the thickness of one. A third and fourth similar doubling
and drawing may be embraced in a preparing system, so that the number
of doublings the flax undergoes, before it arrives at the roving
frame, may amount to from one thousand to one hundred thousand,
according to the quality of yarn in progress. Thus, for example, the
doublings on one preparing system may be 6 × 12 × 12 × 12 × 8 =
82,944. The slivers delivered by the last drawing frame are taken to
the roving frame, where they are singly passed through feed rollers
and over gills, and, after drafting to sufficient tenuity, they are
slightly twisted by flyers and wound on bobbins, in which condition
the material--termed "rove" or "rovings"--is ready for the spinning
frame.[2]
_Spinning._--The spinning operation, which follows the roving, is done
in two principal ways, called respectively dry spinning and wet
spinning, the first being used for the lower counts or heavier yarns,
while the second is exclusively adopted in the preparation of fine
yarns. The spinning frame does not differ in principle from the
throstle spinning machine used in cotton manufacture. The bobbins of
flax rove are arranged in rows on each side of the frame (the spinning
frames being all double) on pins in an inclined plane. The rove
passes downwards through an eyelet or guide to a pair of nipping
rollers between which and the final drawing rollers, placed in the
case of dry spinning from 18 to 22 in. lower down, the fibre receives
its final draft while passing over and under cylinders and
guide-plate, and attains that degree of tenuity which the finished
yarn must possess. From the last rollers the now attenuated material,
in passing to the flyers receives the degree of twist which compacts
the fibres into the round hard cord which constitutes spun yarn; and
from the flyers it is wound on the more slowly rotating spool within
the flyer arms, centred on the top of the spindle. The amount of twist
given to the thread at the spinning frame varies from 1.5 to 2 times
the square root of the count. In wet spinning the general sequence of
operations is the same, but the rove, as unwound from its bobbin,
first passes through a trough of water heated to about 120° Fahr.; and
the interval between the two pairs of rollers in which the drawing out
of the rove is accomplished is very much shorter. The influence of the
hot water on the flax fibre appears to be that it softens the gummy
substance which binds the separate cells together, and thereby allows
the elementary cells to a certain extent to be drawn out without
breaking the continuity of the fibre; and further it makes a finer,
smoother and more uniform strand than can be obtained by dry spinning.
The extent to which the original strick of flax as laid on the feeding
roller for (say) the production of a 50 lea yarn is, by doublings and
drawings, extended, when it reaches the spinning spindle, may be
stated thus: 35 times on spreading frame, 15 times on first drawing
frame, 15 times on second drawing frame, 14 times on third drawing
frame, 15 times on roving frame and 10 times on spinning frame, in all
16,537,500 times its original length, with 8 × 12 × 16 = 1536
doublings on the three drawing frames. That is to say, 1 yd. of
hackled line fed into the spreading frame is spread out, mixed with
other fibres, to a length of about 9400 m. of yarn, when the above
drafts obtain. The drafts are much shorter for the majority of yarns.
The next operation is reeling from the bobbins into hanks. By act of
parliament, throughout the United Kingdom the standard measure of flax
yard is the "lea," called also in Scotland the "cut" of 300 yds. The
flax is wound or reeled on a reel having a circumference of 90 in. (2½
yds.) making "a thread," and one hundred and twenty such threads form
a lea. The grist or count of all fine yarns is estimated by the number
of leas in 1 lb.; thus "50 lea" indicates that there are 50 leas or
cuts of 300 yds. each in 1 lb. of the yard so denominated. With the
heavier yarns in Scotland the quality is indicated by their weight per
"spyndle" of 48 cuts or leas; thus "3 lb. tow yarn" is such as weighs
3 lb. per spyndle, equivalent to "16 lea."
The hanks of yarn from wet spinning are either dried in a loft with
artificial heat or exposed over ropes in the open air. When dry they
are twisted back and forward to take the wiry feeling out of the yarn,
and made up in bundles for the market as "grey yarn." English spinners
make up their yarns into "bundles" of 20 hanks, each hank containing
10 leas; Irish spinners make hanks of 12 leas, 16(2/3) of which form a
bundle; Scottish manufacturers adhere to the spyndle containing 4
hanks of 12 cuts or leas.
Commercial qualities of yarn range from about 8 lb. tow yarns (6 lea)
up to 160 lea line yarn. Very much finer yarn up even to 400 lea may
be spun from the system of machines found in many mills; but these
higher counts are only used for fine thread for sewing and for the
making of lace. The highest counts of cut line flax are spun in Irish
mills for the manufacture of fine cambrics and lawns which are
characteristic features of the Ulster trade. Exceedingly high counts
have sometimes been spun by hand, and for the preparation of the
finest lace threads it is said the Belgian hand spinners must work in
damp cellars, where the spinner is guided by the sense of touch alone,
the filament being too fine to be seen by the eye. Such lace yarn is
said to have been sold for as much as £240 per lb. In the Great
Exhibition of 1851, yarn of 760 lea, equal to about 130 m. per lb.,
was shown which had been spun by an Irish woman eighty-four years of
age. In the same exhibition there was shown by a Cambray manufacturing
firm hand-spun yarn equal to 1200 warp and 1600 weft or to more than
204 and 272 m. per lb. respectively.
_Bleaching._--A large proportion of the linen yarn of commerce undergoes
a more or less thorough bleaching before it is handed over to the
weaver. Linen yarns in the green condition contain such a large
proportion of gummy and resinous matter, removable by bleaching, that
cloths which might present a firm close texture in their natural
unbleached state would become thin and impoverished in a perfectly
bleached condition. Nevertheless, in many cases it is much more
satisfactory to weave the yarns in the green or natural colour, and to
perform all bleaching operations in the piece. Manufacturers allow about
20 to 25% of loss in weight of yarn in bleaching from the green to the
fully bleached stage; and the intermediate stages of boiled, improved,
duck, cream, half bleach and three-quarters bleach, all indicating a
certain degree of bleaching, have corresponding degrees of loss in
weight. The differences in colour resulting from different degrees of
bleaching are taken advantage of for producing patterns in certain
classes of linen fabrics.
Linen thread is prepared from the various counts of fine bleached line
yarn by winding the hanks on large spools, and twisting the various
strands, two, three, four or six cord as the case may be, on a doubling
spindle similar in principle to the yarn spinning frame, excepting, of
course, the drawing rollers. A large trade in linen thread has been
created by its use in the machine manufacture of boots and shoes,
saddlery and other leather goods, and in heavy sewing-machine work
generally. The thread industry is largely developed at Lisburn near
Belfast, at Johnstone near Glasgow, Bridport, Dorsetshire, and at
Paterson, New Jersey, United States. Fine cords, net twine and ropes are
also twisted from flax.
Weaving.--The difficulties in the way of power-loom linen weaving,
combined with the obstinate competition of hand-loom weavers, delayed
the introduction of factory weaving of linen fabrics for many years
after the system was fully applied to other textiles. The principal
difficulty arose through the hardness and inelasticity of the linen
yarns, owing to which the yarn frequently broke under the tension to
which it was subjected. Competition with the hand-loom against the
power-loom in certain classes of work is conceivable, although it is
absolutely impossible for the work of the spinning wheel to stand
against the rivalry of drawing, roving and spinning frames. To the
present day, in Ireland especially, a great deal of fine weaving is done
by hand-loom. Warden states that power was applied on a small scale to
the weaving of canvas in London about 1812; that in 1821 power-looms
were started for weaving linen at Kirkcaldy, Scotland; and that in 1824
Maberly & Co. of Aberdeen had two hundred power-looms erected for linen
manufacture. The power-loom has been in uninterrupted use in the
Broadford factory, Aberdeen, which then belonged to Maberly & Co., down
to the present day, and that firm may be credited with being the
effective introducers of power-loom weaving in the linen trade.
The various operations connected with linen weaving, such as winding,
warping, dressing, beaming and drawing-in, do not differ in essential
features from the like processes in the case of cotton weaving, &c.,
neither is there any significant modification in the looms employed (see
WEAVING). Dressing is a matter of importance in the preparation of linen
warps for beaming. It consists in treating the spread yarn with flour or
farina paste, applied to it by flannel-covered rollers, the lowermost of
which revolves in a trough of paste. The paste is equalized on the yarn
by brushes, and dried by passing the web over steam-heated cylinders
before it is finally wound on the beam for weaving.
Fabrics.
Linen fabrics are numerous in variety and widely different in their
qualities, appearance and applications, ranging from heavy sail-cloth
and rough sacking to the most delicate cambrics, lawns and scrims. The
heavier manufactures include as a principal item sail-cloth, with
canvas, tarpaulin, sacking and carpeting. The principal seats of the
manufacture of these linens are Dundee, Arbroath, Forfar, Kirkcaldy,
Aberdeen and Barnsley. The medium weight linens, which are used for a
great variety of purposes, such as tent-making, towelling, covers,
outer garments for men, linings, upholstery work, &c., include duck,
huckaback, crash, tick, dowlas, osnaburg, low sheetings and low brown
linens. Plain bleached linens form a class by themselves, and include
principally the materials for shirts and collars and for bed sheets.
Under the head of twilled linens are included drills, diapers and
dimity for household use; and damasks for table linen, of which two
kinds are distinguished--single or five-leaf damask, and double or
eight-leaf damask, the pattern being formed by the intersection of
warp and weft yarns at intervals of five and eight threads of yarn
respectively. The fine linens are cambrics, lawns and handkerchiefs;
and lastly, printed and dyed linen fabrics may be assigned to a
special though not important class. In a general way it may be said
regarding the British industry that the heavy linen trade centres in
Dundee; medium goods are made in most linen manufacturing districts;
damasks are chiefly produced in Belfast, Dunfermline and Perth; and
the fine linen manufactures have their seat in Belfast and the north
of Ireland. Leeds and Barnsley are the centres of the linen trade in
England.
Linen fabrics have several advantages over cotton, resulting
principally from the microscopic structure and length of the flax
fibre. The cloth is much smoother and more lustrous than cotton cloth;
and, presenting a less "woolly" surface, it does not soil so readily,
nor absorb and retain moisture so freely, as the more spongy cotton;
and it is at once a cool, clean and healthful material for
bed-sheeting and clothing. Bleached linen, starched and dressed,
possesses that unequalled purity, gloss and smoothness which make it
alone the material suitable for shirt-fronts, collars and wristbands;
and the gossamer delicacy, yet strength, of the thread it may be spun
into fits it for the fine lace-making to which it is devoted. Flax is
a slightly heavier material than cotton, while its strength is about
double.
As regards the actual number of spindles and power-looms engaged in
linen manufacture, the following particulars are taken from the report
of the Flax Supply Association for 1905:--
+------------------+------+----------+------+------------+
| | | Number of| | Number of |
| Country. | Year.| Spindles | Year.| Power-looms|
| | | for Flax | | for Linen |
| | | Spinning.| | Weaving. |
|------------------+------+----------+------+------------+
| Austria-Hungary | 1903 | 280,414 | 1895 | 3357 |
| Belgium | 1902 | 280,000 | 1900 | 3400 |
| England and Wales| 1905 | 49,941 | 1905 | 4424 |
| France | 1902 | 455,838 | 1891 | 18,083 |
| Germany | 1902 | 295,796 | 1895 | 7557 |
| Holland | 1896 | 8000 | 1891 | 1200 |
| Ireland | 1905 | 851,388 | 1905 | 34,498 |
| Italy | 1902 | 77,000 | 1902 | 3500 |
| Norway | .. | .. | 1880 | 120 |
| Russia | 1902 | 300,000 | 1889 | 7312 |
| Scotland | 1905 | 160,085 | 1905 | 17,185 |
| Spain | .. | .. | 1876 | 1000 |
| Sweden | .. | .. | 1884 | 286 |
+------------------+------+----------+------+------------+
_British Exports of Linen Yarn and Cloth._
+---------------------------+------------+------------+------------+------------+
| | 1891. | 1896. | 1901. | 1906. |
+---------------------------+------------+------------+------------+------------+
| Weight of linen yarn | | | | |
| in pounds | 14,859,900 | 18,462,300 | 12,971,100 | 14,978,200 |
| Length in yards of linen | | | | |
| piece goods, plain, | | | | |
| bleached or unbleached |144,416,700 |150,849,300 |137,521,000 |173,334,200 |
| Length in yards of linen | | | | |
| piece goods, checked, | | | | |
| dyed or printed, also | | | | |
| damask and diaper | 11,807,600 | 17,986,100 | 8,007,600 | 13,372,100 |
| Length in yards of sail- | | | | |
| cloth | 3,233,400 | 5,372,600 | 4,686,700 | 4,251,400 |
| Total length in yards of | | | | |
| all kinds of linen cloth|159,457,700 |174,208,000 |150,215,300 |190,957,700 |
| Weight in pounds of linen | | | | |
| thread for sewing | 2,474,100 | 2,240,300 | 1,721,000 | 2,181,100 |
+---------------------------+------------+------------+------------+------------+
AUTHORITIES.--History of the trade, &c.: Warden's _Linen Trade,
Ancient and Modern_. Spinning: Peter Sharp, _Flax, Tow and Jute
Spinning_ (Dundee); H. R. Carter, _Spinning and Twisting of Long
Vegetable Fibres_ (London). Weaving: Woodhouse and Milne, _Jute and
Linen Weaving_, part i., Mechanism, part ii., Calculations and Cloth
Structure (Manchester); and Woodhouse and Milne, _Textile Design: Pure
and Applied_ (London). (T. Wo.)