remedy, which is to have a sufficient number of dishes, keep them perfectly clean, and particularly keep the hands clean.

285. Metallic spots. Tbere is no remedy for these. They are caused principally by metallic substance being ground up accidentally with the rags in the manufacture of the paper, or other local causes.

286. Loss of albumen from the paper during silvering, four solution is too weak, or perhaps too alkaline on account of an excess of free ammonia.

287. The prints refuse to tone. This is often the fault of the paper, or may be caused by keeping the print too long, in warm weather, between the printing and the toning, or by traces of hyposulphite in your toning bath, carried there by your fingers otherwise. Many or all of these defects may be caused, too, by cold weather and cold solution-.

288. Mealiness. A great many blame the paper itself for this defect, but one seldom finds any that, with careful manipulation, gives mealy prints. By adopting the following methods, however, one can produce them upon any paper: By printing from a very weak negative; by float-ing the paper upon very weak solution of silver; too much gold in the

287. I believe amateurs generally find it a difficult matter to keep their sensitized paper white for a considerable length of time. When I commenced photography, I was for some time unable to keep my sensitized paper white. It became unfit for printing in about three weeks; but I am now able to keep it, without fuming or using any chemical preparation, for a much longer time. It is now over six months since I bought the last lot, and almost all of it is as white as when I first received it. I cut it first into sizes I use, viz., carte, quarter, half-plate, etc., and place them in an old cigar-box without a lid, but use, instead, two or three thicknesses of yellow tissue - paper as a cover. I then put the cigar-box into a dark cupboard, and when the sensitized paper becomes too dry I just wet the tissue-paper with clean water. This can, of course, be modified. - P. Hardwick.

If the room becomes chilled before morning, the first thing I do is to put a kettle or other vessel of water on the fire or over a gas-stove, and while changing my clothes, filtering the silver, and getting ready for work, the water will become quite hot. I pour this into the silvering - dish, and allow the dish to get hot, and when this is replaced by the silver bath it will raise the temperature to about what is needed, and will remain so long enough to silver what paper is required for a day's work in an ordinary gallery. Where it is required to silver paper for half a day or more, as in some galleries where I have worked, a very good plan I have found is to have a pan large enough for the silvering-dish to sit in, and a couple of pieces across the pan about one and a half or two inches from the bottom, for the silvering-dish to rest upon, and this filled with warm water, which can be kept at the proper temperature, say, about sixty degrees, with a small gas- or coal-oil stove. By this means you have the temperature of your silver solution under complete control all day, if necessary toning - bath; acidity of the toning - bath; using the toning - bath immediately after making it; and, finally, too little gold in the bath. "Washing the prints too long before toning also tends to make them mealy, besides being injurious in other respects.

- H. A. Webb.

289. Although the great annoyance of blistering of the albumen has been alluded to (see Lesson M), another caution as to its prevention may not be lost here. Albumen-paper manufacturers have been appealed to in this matter, and have succeeded more largely than heretofore in remedying the trouble. It is most liable to occur with doubly albumenized paper.

290. It has always been a blot upon the fair face of albumen printing, that the more delicately beautiful its products, the more they were apt to fade. The prime cause of this is the imperfect washing which the prints are allowed to have. This should be a matter of conscience with every photographer. He should use all the means in his power to secure the thorough washing of his prints, and in no respect allow any carelessness on the part of his assistants. And yet it is indeed difficult sometimes to eliminate the hyposulphite of soda (the undoubted fading element) from the prints, wash them as you will. The operation is largely helped by Mr. demons' alum treatment, given below in his own words. It is so easy of application that it should not be overlooked as one of the means of preserving the fame of our art.

289. To prevent albumen blisters, first immerse the prints in a freshly prepared and strong fixing solution, and then pass them into a weaker one. Then wash the prints in a small quantity of water first, and gradually increase the supply as the washing progresses. This treatment will thoroughly prevent the blistering of albumenized paper. - J. L. Gihon.

Pour into a bath some rectified spirits of wine and distilled water in equal parts. After the washing operation which follows the toning, the prints are plunged into this bath, which may last a long time. The immersion of five minutes suffices, and then the paper will be seen to be more transparent. After this bath the prints should be washed once only, and then fixed and finished in the ordinary way. - Mons. Andres.

290. For eliminating the prints completely of hyposulphite of soda in from eight to fifteen minutes, make a saturated solution of alum and water. After the prints are fixed, immerse them in sufficient of the solution to cover them; let them remain two or three minutes, then pour off and throw away the solution, and rinse off the prints one or two minutes, and repeat this operation twice, and finally rinse the prints well. The result will be the same if the prints are allowed to remain in the solution, after the first immersion being the same as described, the prints being rinsed well after each immersion. No traces of hyposulphite of soda will remain in the prints after going through this process. - John R. Clemons.