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+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 77263 ***
+
+
+
+
+  THE HISTORY
+  OF A
+  POT OF VARNISH.
+
+
+  FROM SCRIBNER’S MONTHLY.
+
+
+  PUBLISHED BY
+  MURPHY AND COMPANY,
+  VARNISH MAKERS.
+
+
+
+
+  Copyrighted, 1880, by MURPHY & CO., Newark, N. J., and Cleveland, O.
+
+
+
+
+THE HISTORY OF A POT OF VARNISH.
+
+
+Together with their love of the practical in the industrial arts,
+Americans have a ready faculty of discovering an interest touching
+almost on the romantic in the origin and production of what pass
+ordinarily for useful and prosaic things. Herein lies a part of the
+secret of their great success in mechanical pursuits. This inborn
+mechanical curiosity has led many a young American to take apart his
+mother’s self-winding tape measure, or the family sewing machine, just
+“to see how the thing was made.” We seldom, any of us, lose the desire
+to visit machine-shops and factories, and see with our own eyes how the
+work of creation, in a limited way, is carried forward, by men who,
+from habit, look upon their work as dull routine, while to our fresh
+eyes, every deft movement is filled with grace, and each stage in the
+transformation of the material into the manufactured object is a new
+wonder.
+
+[Illustration: Murphy & Co.’s Varnish Factory, Newark, N. J.]
+
+Everybody knows something about the bright, amber-colored fluid called
+varnish, but few persons, probably, know how varied and interesting a
+story is wrapped up in this subtle substance, which lends beauty and
+durability to almost every product of the workshop and studio. Varnish
+factories are comparatively few, and their doors seldom stand wide
+open. But there is nothing secretive about varnish. It speaks to the
+nostrils of close companionship with turpentine,--the pungent aroma of
+which some affect to like, and most persons find very disagreeable.
+The linseed oil in the varnish cannot be detected by a novice; and
+thousands who are not practical painters, and only use the fluid as
+household amateurs, have doubtless wondered what could be the nature of
+the illusive material that gives to the varnish its sticky quality and
+elastic body. This third ingredient is the resinous juice of a tree. It
+is analogous to the little lumps of pitch that boys sometimes find on
+a pine board that has been exposed to the sun, and once in their lives
+discover to be a very sticky substitute for chewing-gum, which, in
+itself, is a kind of resin. Varnish resins are few in number compared
+with the vast number of resins of one kind and another. They are not
+got from the tree that produced them, but are mined a little below the
+surface of the earth, where they have lain and ripened for hundreds,
+perhaps thousands, of years. This is true especially of gum copal, the
+commercial name of the most valuable of the varnish resins. These three
+ingredients, gum copal, linseed oil, and turpentine are brought to the
+door of the varnish maker. It is his province to mix them by applying
+formulas which are the result of years of experiment and hard-earned
+experience.
+
+[Illustration: Murphy & Co.’s Varnish Factory, Cleveland, Ohio.]
+
+Varnish making is one of the new and growing industries of the United
+States. This is as it ought to be, for Americans use more artificial
+varnish than any other people, and even before they have reached the
+point of fully supplying themselves, begin to think seriously of
+providing their neighbors and transatlantic friends with a better
+article than can be sold abroad for the same money. Fifty years ago
+we relied mostly upon England and France for the vast quantities of
+varnish employed in the industrial arts of this country. Varnish
+manufacture was somewhat understood, but for many years the Americans
+were content to make for themselves only the coarse varieties of
+the article, while they went abroad for the higher grades needed
+to impart luster to their coaches and pianos and to fine furniture.
+Finally came the ability and the desire to excel in this industry as in
+every other. Varnish materials were at hand. The enterprising traders
+of New-York and the once flourishing New England sea-ports, during
+their East India and African voyages, were not slow to discover in
+gum copal a profitable article for the return cargo, and to-day more
+than half of the varnish gums of commerce are brought to this country.
+Three large houses have almost a monopoly of the trade. It is further
+estimated that about two-thirds of the artificial varnish product of
+the world is used in the United States. In the main this is a matter
+of national congratulation. It is another proof of the unexampled
+growth of American manufactures, of the rapid increase of population
+and wealth, and of a wide-spread and active state of refined society.
+In no other country can be found so many comfortably furnished houses,
+in which the piano and other musical instruments, as well as furniture
+of equal adornment and use, are the rule rather than the exception.
+In no other part of the world does so large a part of the population
+ride in its own carriage; and in the matter of railway cars, those of
+America surpass the whole world in number and finish. All of these
+mechanical contrivances and articles of use require coats of varnish to
+render them attractive to the eye and proof against early decay. But
+from another point of view, the aspect of the immense varnish trade
+of this country is not so pleasing. It tells of national extravagance
+and wastefulness, and of the fragile character of many manufactured
+articles. Americans are the greatest carriage and furniture breakers
+in the world. They have more furniture, and replace it oftener, than
+citizens of the same relative classes in other countries. In Europe,
+the breaking of a carriage on account of the horses taking fright is a
+very rare occurrence. American horses have extra wildness of spirits,
+and runaways and splintered carriages are every-day occurrences.
+
+[Illustration: Surfacer Department Mills.]
+
+I was initiated into the mysteries of varnish manufacture at the
+factory of Murphy & Co., located in Newark, New Jersey, a great
+industrial city, which owes its growth and prominence to its nearness
+to the metropolis, its water and railroad facilities, and its
+ability to give cheap and comfortable houses to its working-men. A
+thirty-minute ride from New-York, by the Pennsylvania Railway, placed
+me at the Chestnut street dépôt in Newark, whence it was a three minute
+walk to McWhorter street, where goats and children were taking life
+pleasantly together in the September sunshine. Somber brick walls,
+surrounding plain brick buildings, succeeded one another along the
+street and gave tokens of activity within. I knew that Murphy & Co.
+were classed by the trade as one of the great varnish-making firms
+in the United States, and reaching No. 238, which appeared to be
+the beginning of the end of McWhorter street, the exterior of the
+long, rather low brick building made a very modest impression of the
+extensive out-buildings, warehouses, workshops and great chimneys which
+were concealed behind it. Fine shade trees added grace to the prim
+exterior, and the generally unkept street had suddenly assumed an air
+of care as well as of prosperity. The factory seemed to consume its own
+noise, for the street was very quiet, the stillness being broken only
+by a picturesque little colored boy in a peagreen jacket, and with his
+trousers rolled up to his knees, who was standing in the middle of the
+street, yelling “Pa!” at regular intervals, until a sturdy African put
+his head out of a warehouse door and soothed his offspring. Here was a
+coincidence: copal gum and the ebony descendant of the copal digger, in
+their distant wanderings from Africa, had found a home together at a
+varnish factory in Newark, New Jersey.
+
+The office of the Factory, reached by a most unassuming street
+entrance, was commodious, elegant, and pervaded by a sense of order and
+business activity. The history of the firm is rather remarkable, and
+is an excellent illustration of American pluck, enterprise and method
+in business matters. From very small beginnings, the firm has attained
+its present growth and reputation in a short space of fourteen years. A
+solid foundation was laid at the beginning. They realized at the outset
+that the only road to success was by the closest personal supervision,
+and devotion to the principle that if they took care to attain a
+uniform perfection of quality in their products, the profits would
+take care of themselves. During the early years of the business, Mr.
+Murphy worked constantly over the kettles, and to-day every practical
+detail has his personal supervision. Having begun free from the set
+ways and prejudices of varnish-makers, he was the better prepared to
+discover and adopt improved methods. To-day they have, as a result of
+their efforts, a large capital invested in a thoroughly established
+business, which, during the past six years, has grown with steady and
+extraordinary rapidity.
+
+The extensive works of Murphy & Co., in Newark, are supplemented by
+equal manufacturing facilities in Cleveland, Ohio, but the Western
+department relies upon the Eastern factory for the highest grades of
+varnishes. Several years ago the firm was shrewd enough to see that
+the growth of domestic business was to be very largely in the West,
+and deemed it wise to establish branches, in 1871, in Chicago and
+Cleveland, and become directly identified with the business prosperity
+of those sections. Two years’ experience proved that it was better to
+consolidate their Western facilities at one point, and the erection of
+their extensive works in Cleveland, at Canal and Harrison streets, was
+at once begun. During the past six years the business of the Western
+department has rapidly increased, and from Cleveland radiates their
+entire Western trade.
+
+[Illustration: Gum Sorting Room.]
+
+Before he introduces a visitor to the factory proper, Mr. Murphy
+always instructs the candidate for the honor in the first degree of
+the subject, in a knowledge of what copal is. For this purpose his
+museum of fossil resins affords an excellent means of object study.
+To pique the interest of his visitor he first hands him a little
+polished cylinder of a hard, yellowish-hued substance, resembling
+amber. Some opaque object darkens the otherwise clear and brilliant
+cylinder, which is brought between the eye and the light, disclosing
+a pale, lemon-colored butterfly in all the delicacy and beauty of its
+original creation. Encompassed in the pure, transparent mass, it is
+as perfectly posed as if it were in the sunshine of a June morning,
+resting its tissue wings and sipping the dew from a clover blossom. It
+looks as fresh as a bonnet in a milliner’s window, and as if it came
+out of the chrysalis only the day before; yet the butterfly, if we are
+to believe the sayings of science, first tried its delicate wings in
+some African forest of the tertiary period, how many thousands of years
+ago geologists do not venture to say. Happy insect, to have its beauty
+thus immortalized! How did the butterfly get within the cylinder?
+Probably it was playing listlessly from tropical flower to flower and
+tree to tree. It alighted on a limpid, enticing substance which adhered
+to the bark of a gigantic tree. This substance proved as fragrant as
+a flower and as treacherous as bird-lime. The unwary butterfly found
+itself glued to its grave. In a little while the oozing sap covered
+its delicate head, the fluttering wings were stayed, and, in less than
+an hour, perhaps, the butterfly, in all its splendor, was embalmed for
+the ages. Before or during the decay of the tree, the hardened lump of
+sap fell on the sands and was buried beneath the mold. In the course of
+time the forest almost disappeared through the agency of wind and fire,
+or perhaps through slow decay. The lump of gum lay hardening, century
+in and century out, beneath the surface of a burning desert, until a
+naked negro, in his desultory search, brought it to light and sold it
+to the traders as fossil copal, which is solid varnish of the finest
+quality.
+
+[Illustration: Oil Boiling.]
+
+Western nations have derived the use of varnish from the Chinese and
+Japanese, who, originally, merely applied what nature placed ready-made
+to their hand. What would an American painter think of walking
+into his grove of varnish-trees, when he wanted a pot of varnish,
+and returning in half an hour with a bucketful of the costly fluid,
+procured as easily as a Vermont farmer gathers a bucketful of maple
+sap in the spring of the year? This is a natural varnish and is called
+Lacquer, and everybody nowadays knows the beauty and excellence of the
+lacquer-ware of the ingenious Chinese and Japanese. The resin from
+the varnish-tree (which belongs to the same family as our poison ivy,
+dogwood and sumach, and to the botanical order of _anacar diacea_) is
+held in solution, in the right proportion for use, by oils which the
+tree simultaneously produces. But the resins of which the artificial
+varnish is made were deficient naturally in these solvents, and what
+of them they ever contained disappeared as the gum hardened. Varnish
+manufacture is the process of restoring these solvents in new and
+greater proportions. Many varieties of trees are producing varnish
+resins in different parts of the world to-day, but the resin is unfit
+for the finer grades of varnish until it has ripened, in the course of
+time, and become fossil gum. There are resin-producing trees the gum
+of which is not suitable for the body of varnish, yet which produce
+one of the principal solvents,--turpentine. Such is the long-leaved
+pine of the Southern States. The Japanese and Chinese subject their
+natural varnish to a treatment of a simple character, to purify and
+increase its drying properties. The black varnish tree of Burmah and
+the gum-mastic tree of Morocco are allied to the Chinese and Japanese
+species. Efforts have been made to introduce the latter into this
+country without practical results. Young varnish-trees have frequently
+been brought to America, and specimens of the variety are now growing
+in the grounds of the Smithsonian Institute.
+
+[Illustration: Gum Melting.]
+
+Amber, which is found chiefly in the alluvial deposits bordering
+the Black Sea, is the most valuable of the fossil resins. Its extra
+hardness is supposed to be the result of age, far ante-dating that of
+fossil copal. It used to be employed in varnish manufacture, but is now
+too rare and costly. Fossil copal is said to have been first found in
+the blue clay about Highgate, near London, but the most famous fields
+are the narrow strips of barren sea-coast on the eastern shores of
+Africa, opposite the island of Zanzibar.
+
+[Illustration: Japan Boiling.]
+
+In 1850, before the steamship and the submarine telegraph
+revolutionized the commercial methods of the world, the port of
+Zanzibar, the Sultan’s capital, located on the western side of the
+island, opposite the main coast, was then, as it is now, the chief
+outlet for the products of the east coast and the interior of Africa.
+Arabs and Hindoos formed the merchant and trading classes. Trading
+with the interior was carried on by means of caravans, which would be
+absent from Zanzibar sometimes five, eight, or even ten years. Traders
+and agents of the merchants traveled continually to and from the coast,
+where they traded with the native copal diggers and with such natives
+as occasionally brought a single ivory tusk to market. Copal barter was
+comparatively easy, but ivory barter was characteristically complex.
+Laying his ivory tusk on a box, the native owner would sit astride one
+end of the tusk and watch the covetous and expostulating trader pile
+up beads, cloth, and articles of barter on the other end, while the
+equally loquacious native would cling to his tusk, and firmly maintain
+that they had not yet found the equilibrium of trade.
+
+[Illustration: Thinning Down and Emptying.]
+
+The copal diggers are an improvident class, as natives of the tropics
+always are. They dig for copal when dire necessity drives them to it,
+and seldom appear before the trader with more than a double-handful of
+gum to sell. On the eastern coast the diggers do not go much above the
+second parallel, or below the twelfth. In searching for a pocket of
+the gum they puncture the sandy surface to a depth of one or two feet
+with a short, small spear resembling the Zulu assegai. They sometimes
+dig a trench eight or ten feet deep if the find is sufficient to
+inspire them to make the necessary exertion. For the last twenty-five
+years, Europeans living at Zanzibar have talked of visiting the copal
+fields, and making an organized search for the gum. The undertaking
+would prove profitable but for the almost perfect certainty that the
+whites of the expedition would quickly succumb to the climate, and
+the Arabs and negroes cannot be prevailed upon to make a systematic
+effort. When India-rubber became a valuable article of commerce, the
+supply of copal from Zanzibar appreciably diminished, not because the
+fields are anywhere near exhausted, but because the indolent natives
+find it easier to gather India-rubber than to dig for gum copal. The
+superiority of Zanzibar copal to other varnish resins is apparent to a
+novice, for it is the hardest and clearest, and comes in thin, small
+flakes, a piece the size of a man’s hand being an uncommonly large
+lump. After being cleaned of its coating of dirt by immersion in strong
+lye, the surface of the copal is found to be uniformly covered with
+little round dots about the size of a pin’s head. This appearance is
+called “goose skin,” and its cause is a matter of doubt and curiosity
+among scientific men. The most probable explanation is that the goose
+skin appearance is due to molecular action. It cannot be the imprint of
+the sand on the gum when it was soft, because in that case the surface
+would be pitted, instead of granulated. Copal trees are producing gum
+in Zanzibar to-day. The new product is comparatively soft, and of
+inferior value for varnish. The Sultan formerly claimed one-eighth of
+all the articles of commerce passing through the Zanzibar custom-house,
+the perquisites of which were farmed out to lesser officials.
+
+[Illustration: Cooper Shop.]
+
+As the demand for varnish gums increased, new fields were discovered.
+Accra, or “North Coast,” fossil resin is an excellent gum, and is
+found in Guinea and on the west shores of Africa, in about the same
+zone as Zanzibar. Some of the gum is very pale and clear in color. It
+is found in larger lumps than the East Coast gum, and is not so hard,
+nor has it the “goose skin” surface. For several years the greater
+part of the fossil resin of commerce has been obtained in the northern
+island of New Zealand. It is called Kauri gum, and is not found below
+the thirty-eighth parallel. This variety of resin is gathered by both
+whites and natives. It is of all degrees of age, hardness, and value,
+the better grades of kauri being found near the decayed stumps of
+trees, that have long since perished. The trees now bearing grow to a
+great height, and some of them are four and five feet in diameter at
+the base. The resinous juice exudes between the body of the tree and
+the bark, and runs down into the ground at the roots. The wood of the
+kauri-tree is much harder than Norway pine, and in color resembles
+mahogany, with which it cannot be compared in fiber or grain. It is a
+lumber-tree and the boxes in which the gum is shipped (usually about
+200 lbs. to the box) are made of the lumber of the tree. Kauri gum
+varies in the size of the lumps, from a few ounces to seventy-five, and
+even one hundred pounds. A fossil resin of much value has been found in
+the Island of Madagascar. Benguela, Congo, and pebble gums (pebble gum
+is found in river-beds, worn to shapes resembling pebble stones) are
+found on the west coast of Africa. The Benguela gum formerly came into
+Europe through Lisbon. The Manilla, Macassar, and Dammar gums found in
+the Philippine Islands, are used for common grades of varnish. Resins
+suitable for varnish manufacture are also found in South America and
+Mexico. The product of the former country is commonly called animé,
+while the Zanzibar copal passes in the London market under the name of
+animi.
+
+These two varieties most commonly contain insects, a fact which
+suggested their allied nomenclature. The Murphy museum holds many
+interesting specimens of insect copal. Ants feed upon the bark of
+the copal-tree, and, it is believed, frequently destroy its life.
+But the copal-tree has its revenge. For when the tree is wounded the
+resinous juice exudes and entraps the tiny enemy. Lumps of gum are
+frequently found as full of ants as a plum pudding is of fruit. Mr.
+Murphy has a fine specimen of accra gum which is the crystal tomb
+of a fly. One piece of Zanzibar shows a perfect grasshopper, which
+looks as if it had just hopped off a Western pasture. Another piece
+preserves a beautiful bumble-bee, in rich and velvety apparel. What a
+dreary existence he must have led in an age long, perhaps, before there
+were boys to sting! A third piece proves that the mosquito is a very
+venerable citizen of this earth. One of the workmen has a small piece
+of gum which is a witness to the predatory character of the spider.
+One afternoon an unlucky fly alighted on the bark of a copal-tree, and
+felt its feet involved in the sticky gum, past extrication. A spider
+traveled that way, and seeing the fly apparently too much engaged in
+sipping some sweet to heed his approach, pounced upon his prey, only
+to be caught as was the fly, and to be incarcerated in the gum with
+his booty in his fangs. Small lizards have been found in gum copal.
+Insects cannot be seen in the gum before it is cleaned. All varnish
+gums used to be shipped in the natural state, but to escape paying the
+American custom duties of ten cents, on a quarter of the weight, which
+is lost in cleaning, the gum is cleaned and purified superficially
+before shipment. The duty has been abrogated, but, nevertheless, it is
+found best to clean the gum before it is put in cargo. The boys that
+do the cleaning in Zanzibar appropriate the most curious specimens
+for themselves, and, for this reason, of late years, insect copal has
+become more rare.
+
+[Illustration: A Bit of Laboratory.]
+
+Gum copal and the other varnish resins reach the factory of Murphy &
+Co. in the original packages. In a long, low room adjoining the storage
+warehouse, boys sit at a long table, placed against the wall, and give
+the gum a second cleaning, after which it is assorted and broken into
+small lumps for the melting-kettles, and stored in large bins in an
+adjoining room. In the cleaning, or chiseling process, the boys use a
+long narrow hatchet which has a blade at one end and a hammer-head at
+the other, and is grasped by the head and socket, and handled like a
+short chisel, for convenience in working around the irregular surface
+of the kauri-lumps. In breaking the lumps the hatchet is used like a
+hammer. The clippings, or chips, and the gum dust are saved, and form
+the body of a cheap varnish.
+
+With the cleaning and the sorting begin the niceties of the business.
+Murphy & Co. owe much of their success--as every other manufacturing
+company that wins a permanent success must--to faithful attention to
+the smallest details. The gums are graded with considerable care before
+they are put up in commercial packages. This firm re-assorts the gum,
+making a number of additional grades, according to kind, clearness or
+purity, and hardness, and keeps the different lots separate throughout
+the process of manufacture, to which fact may be ascribed the
+homogeneity and unvarying quality of their products of each particular
+grade. The gum-room is in the remotest angle of the factory grounds,
+and there the gum is made ready for the melting-room and furnaces
+adjoining.
+
+Two other ingredients have to be in store before the manufacturer can
+proceed with his work. Of these, turpentine needs no special treatment.
+It arrives at the factory in barrels, and is stored in four massive
+iron tanks, which together hold about ten thousand gallons.
+
+The oil-shop, where the oil is boiled and otherwise prepared, is a
+small, but massively built, structure, located in the center of the
+works, and contains two wrought iron kettles substantially set in
+masonry, each of which has a capacity for boiling five hundred gallons
+of oil. Experiments with the oil are made in the laboratory, and
+the ideas there developed are carried out in a practical way in the
+oil-shop. This department is in charge of Mr. Murphy’s younger brother,
+who brings to his work a natural liking for its duties, strengthened by
+a special technical education at the Columbia College School of Mines.
+
+On the successful preparation of the oil, depend, in a great measure,
+the drying properties, elasticity, toughness, and clearness of the
+varnish; and the difficulties of a uniform treatment are very much
+increased by the want of uniformity in the raw oil. This does not arise
+from adulteration of the oil, but from the different characteristics of
+different lots of seed. The manufacture of linseed-oil consists simply
+in crushing the seed and expressing the oil by hydraulic pressure, but
+to secure the finest quality of oil, the linseed must be grown under
+favorable conditions, and harvested only after it is fully matured.
+If the season should be unfavorable, or if the crop is cut before
+it has fully ripened, or if a lot contains an undue percentage of
+foreign seed, the resulting oil is not suitable for the finest grades
+of varnishes. Each parcel of raw oil, therefore, is carefully tested
+by Murphy & Co., and only such accepted as meet the tests which their
+experience shows them are necessary to furnish satisfactory results
+in their work. As the oil is received in the factory it is pumped
+into large tanks in the second story of the main warehouse, which
+communicates by pipes with the large boiling-pots in the oil-shop.
+After treatment there, it is allowed to run out of the kettle into a
+large iron vat, and from that is pumped back into the main storehouse,
+into tanks of five hundred gallons each, and which, therefore, hold
+a single boiling. From one to six months is given it to settle and
+brighten. The foreign matter settles to the bottom of the pot, while
+the oil on top, which has become as clear as amber, is drawn off as
+it is required for mixing with melted gum. A dozen or more different
+kinds of prepared oils are kept in store, which vary in the quantity
+and the kind of the dryer boiled with them, according to the results
+sought for in the completed varnish. Thus the success or the failure
+of varnish-making must depend greatly on the care and fidelity of the
+foreman of the shop.
+
+A double system of pipes, connecting with the boiled oil and turpentine
+storage tanks, traverse the yard and enter all the out-buildings,
+where their ingredients are required for mixing with the melted gum.
+Nothing could exceed the neatness of the storage-room. The tanks are
+painted on the outside, and kept perfectly clean. There is a purpose in
+this. Good varnish cannot be produced if the workmen fall into careless
+and slovenly habits. To make cleanliness a habit, and, therefore, a
+matter of no special mental effort, the utmost neatness is maintained
+from the gum-room to the business office, and even in the factory yard.
+
+With the three ingredients at hand, the making of the varnish begins.
+It is desired to make a varnish of a certain quality. The foreman of
+the melting-room goes to the gum-room with his large copper kettle,
+holding 125 gallons, which is set on four small iron wheels. He takes
+from one of the many bins 100 or 150 pounds of the requisite kind of
+gum, returns with it to the melting-room, covers the kettle with a
+sheet-iron cover, which is provided with an exit for the thick and
+noxious fumes of boiling gum, and pushes the kettle into one of the
+great fire-places, which has almost the draft of a furnace. The fire
+directly underneath the kettles is very hot, and necessarily so, for
+the hardest kinds of gum will liquefy only after being subjected to a
+very high heat.
+
+When the batch of gum is thoroughly melted the kettle is drawn from
+the fire, and a certain quantity of the prepared oil is poured in. The
+percentage of oil to gum varies greatly, according to the character
+of the varnish which is sought to be produced. After being thoroughly
+stirred, the mixture is pushed into the fire-place again and is
+boiled to a certain point, after which it is then drawn from the fire
+and the temperature of the mixture allowed to fall to about 300°.
+In the meantime the requisite amount of turpentine has been allowed
+to run into an upright receiver, with tube register attached. The
+kettle is drawn under the stop-cock, the turpentine mingles with the
+mixture of oil and gum, and the varnish is practically made. It is
+next strained through coarse muslin and filtered, after which it is
+brought into contact with another system of pipes, and is pumped into
+one of the three or four store-rooms, where large tanks, resting on
+stone platforms, preserve the varnish while it settles and ripens. The
+temperature of the varnish store-room is kept at 70° Fahrenheit during
+the winter.
+
+In the finer grades of varnish, the ripening process requires from
+four to twelve months, and in many instances a much longer time is
+necessary to bring out its best qualities. This is not a matter of
+hap-hazard judgment on the part of the varnish maker. Every tank of
+varnish, during the time of ripening, is subjected to frequent tests
+by a practical carriage painter. It is tried on the same surfaces and
+under the same circumstances as it will be after it goes into the
+hands of the customer. The varnish must meet every test satisfactorily
+before it is allowed to go out of the factory. It is a very whimsical
+substance, and at times the best varnish is so unaccountably obstinate,
+that painters are agreed that it is in some manner allied to the
+evil spirit. What are called the “deviltries” of varnish come under
+fifty or more terms of opprobrium familiar to the paint-house, and
+may be divided into a dozen or more species; there is the “specky”
+family of deviltries, the “crawling” species, the “sweating” variety,
+the “blotching” class, the “peeling” genus, the “cracking” family,
+the “blistering” order, and other analogous misdemeanors that drag
+painters by a string of profanity into the hands of Satan. When varnish
+suddenly departs from its usual good conduct, and begins its pranks,
+just as the painter is in a hurry to finish an important job, the
+painter is none too slow to lay the responsibility for his trouble on
+the varnish-maker, or somebody whose exact accountability he forgets
+in his rage, and is human enough not to see that he himself may be to
+blame. The “deviltries” of the business are as annoying to the varnish
+maker as the painter. If the varnish came from a first-class factory,
+the chances are as eight to ten that, if it is put to the purpose for
+which it was made and then behaves ill, the fault lay more with the
+painter, and with the conditions under which it was used, than with
+the material itself. Varnish loses its bad temper as a rule, in a dry,
+warm, well-ventilated paint-shop, which of course ought to be clean and
+free from dust. Varnish despises an ignorant painter as much as a horse
+does an ignorant driver. Varnish-makers have to bear the short-comings
+of ignorance with resignation and meekness. When a barrel of varnish
+is returned with the indorsement, that “it contains a devil,” the
+varnish-maker mutters: “Another stupid painter.” But like the father of
+the naughtiest boy in the neighborhood, he knows the character of the
+pesky thing too well, to assert that it was not as devilish as reported.
+
+The precautions taken by Murphy & Co. to assure themselves that
+their varnishes will behave well, if properly treated, have assisted
+greatly in securing for their varnishes a reputation for “perfection
+of quality.” Not only is the varnish strained and filtered before it
+goes into the ripening tanks, but also again before it goes into the
+barrel for shipment. They have introduced an improvement into the
+filtering machine by which the ordinarily tedious process is urged
+forward with ten-fold rapidity. The neat cans with the handsome labels,
+and the barrels in which the varnish is shipped, are both made by
+the firm, a large building in the rear of the melting-room being set
+aside for that purpose. The ground floor is a cooper-shop, and the
+second floor a tin-shop, both departments being supplied with the most
+improved appliances, and the best material and skill. A large room
+has been reserved in the new warehouse, just completed, to be used
+for painting the barrels, which is an indication of the care paid by
+the firm to minor details. On the second floor of the same building,
+in the gable-end, has been constructed a room, which is supposed to
+be as fire-proof as iron and brick and stone and mortar can make an
+apartment. This is the new laboratory. The firm believe that it will
+be in the future, as it has been in the past, the most profitable room
+in the establishment. A unique branch of the establishment is the
+“Publication Office,” which occupies two large, cheery rooms in the
+basement. Two practical printers are in charge, and have at hand a
+full stock of job printing material and two modern presses. The neat
+typographical dress of the Company’s catalogues and price lists speak
+well of the practical success of this curious appendage to a varnish
+factory. A miniature newspaper, called “The Copal Bug,” is occasionally
+issued.
+
+Murphy & Co. have made an important departure from the old methods of
+varnish manufacturing by establishing a factory for the manufacture
+of surfacers for coach and car work, as an auxiliary to their varnish
+business proper. This factory is several blocks removed from the
+main establishment, the two being connected by telephone. Since the
+“deviltries” of varnish, above described, are very frequently due to
+the improper preparation of the painted surface to which the varnish
+is to be applied, the firm believe that, by making surfacers already
+prepared for application and the best calculated for producing a
+suitable surface for varnishing, they would not only save themselves
+and the too frequently innocent varnish the anathemas of careless
+painters, but confer a blessing on the painter as well. These prepared
+paints have been named “A. B. C. Surfacers,” and very appropriately,
+too, for the priming, leveling, and smoothing coats on which the
+varnish rests are the first steps toward the completed task of the
+painter, and if the first steps are badly taken, the best varnish in
+the world will not save the job.
+
+Six or seven years ago American varnish-makers were vainly striving to
+compete in their own market with the highest grades of English coach
+and railway varnish. Murphy & Co. have led the way to a solution of
+this highly important problem for this country, and now produce a
+varnish which has the entire confidence of many of the first carriage
+builders and railway companies of the United States, and by some is
+regarded superior to English varnishes. In a very few shops the English
+article still maintains a show of supremacy, by virtue of the survival
+of the old-time prejudice against American goods. The best American
+varnishes are now making their way in the markets of Europe, and in
+this industry, as in so many other important branches of manufacture,
+America has cast off the yoke of dependence on the Old World.
+
+Murphy & Company will be glad to send to any address, upon application,
+descriptive lists of their Varnishes, containing detailed information
+of each grade, with prices attached.
+
+[Illustration: Shipping Room.]
+
+
+
+
+TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES
+
+
+Typo corrected on page 4: “an” to “and”.
+
+Inconsistencies in hyphenation have been left unchanged.
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 77263 ***