Brown

The solution is made up of varying quantities of decoctions of logwood and Guinea-wood. For darkening, a small quantity of iron protosulphate is employed.

Russia-Red

Decoction of cochineal with a tin salt and some saccharic acid, and, if a dark tint is demanded, addition of some logwood extract.

Grey

Brushing with decoction of sumach, and subsequent treatment with a feeble solution of iron protosulphate. Addition of logwood and yellow Brazilwood to the sumach decoction produces a greenish-grey tint.

The aniline colours can be employed without any previous preparation of the leather. The bluish tint so greatly liked in black gloves is obtained by washing the finished article with sal-ammoniac solution. If it is required to keep the seams white, they are covered with flour-paste with which some fat has been admixed. Instead of brushes, one may sometimes use a sponge. (Ding. Polyt. Journ.)

Kid gloves of good quality, especially when light-coloured, are often thrown away when soiled, and made no further use of. By employing the following simple means, they might easily be dyed violet, black, or yellow, by the owner himself, and made to look almost equal to new: - The gloves are first soaked in a little hot water containing dissolved crystals of soda or potash, whichever colour may be desired, and after a 25 minutes' bath they are taken out, washed, rinsed, and wrung. When the gloves are thus cleaned, they are stretched tightly on a block, and the dye applied.

Violet

According to the tint desired, aniline or orseille violet must be used. Apply a little of the colour by means of a brush or rag dipped in the colouring liquid. Lay on several coats of alum dissolved in water; then dry. Then apply one or two layers of the dye, which must be always hot. The kid is polished, before finally drying, with a pad made of a cork covered with a piece of woollen cloth. This is the best way of regaining the gloss.

Black

The same means are employed throughout.

Leather

The following stains for leather are selected from the best authors on the subject: -

Dyeing Gun-Metal

For " blacking " gun-barrels, 2 oz. solution of litric acid, 4 oz. tincture of steel, 3 oz. spirits of wine, 3 oz. sweet spirits of nitre, 1 oz. vitriol blue, 1 1/2 pint rain-water. Scour the barrel smooth; remove all grease with lime, then coat with the mixture freely with a piece of sponge, but not so as to run about the barrel. Let stand in a cool place for about 10 hours; then remove to a warm room, and let stand till dry, when the rust will fly off, and not be sticky or streaky. The barrels are not dry, and must stand until quite dry, or the result will be a red barrel. The scratching must be done with lard, then boil for about 10 minutes; take out and wipe inside and out; let stand till cool, then scratch to remove the dead rust; wipe with clean rag, then coat with the mixture lightly; let stand till dry. Scratch, boil, etc, as in first coat for 6 coats, when the barrels may be finished by oiling. If this process be carried out, the barrels will be as black •as soot. The furniture should be polished as bright as possible, and blued in the second blue, which will be what gunsmiths call " blacking."

Browning Gunbarrels

Wet a piece of rag with antimony chloride, dip it into olive-oil, and rub the barrel over. In 48 hours it will be covered with a fine coat of rust. Remove this with a scratch-brush, and apply oil.

Iron And Steel

Dissolve in 4 parts water, 2 of crystallized iron chloride, 2 of antimony chloride, and 1 of gallic acid, and apply the solution with a sponge or cloth to the article, and dry it in the air. Repeat this any number of times, according to the depth of colour which it is desired to produce. Wash with water, and dry, and finally rub the articles over with boiled linseed-oil. The metal thus receives a brown tint, and resists moisture. The antimony chloride should be as little acid as possible.

Silver

(1) Silver which has become much tarnished may be restored by immersion in a warm solution of 1 part cyanide of potassium to 8 of water. (This mixture is extremely poisonous.) Washing well with water, and drying, will produce a somewhat dead-white appearance, which may be quickly changed to a brilliant lustre by polishing with a soft leather and rouge.

(2) Have ready a basin containing equal parts vitriol and water, make the article white in a gas flame (not white heat, but a snowy white, which it will assume after exposure to the flame), then plunge it into the pickle, and there leave it for 1/2 hour, then dry in box dust.

(3) Heat to a dull red (if there is no lead present), allow to cool, and when cold boil in a pickle of water acidulated with sulphuric acid (30 water, 1 acid) until perfectly white; take out, swill in clean water, and burnish the prominent parts; dry in hot boxwood sawdust.

(4) A simple way - but not half so good - is to brush up with whiting moistened with turpentine, and then wash out in clean hot water and dry in the sawdust.

Zinc

Puscher employs acetate of lead for this purpose. On applying this substance, mixed with a minium preparation, a reddish-brown tinge is obtained. The cupola of the synagogue at Nuremburg was thus coloured, as an experiment, over a year ago, and to all appearance is yet unaffected by the weather. By adding other bases, lighter or darker tints of grey and yellow may be obtained, giving the zinc-work the appearance of carved stone. With a solution of chlorate of copper, the preparation turns the sheets of zinc black. (Iron.)

Dyeing Yellow

This requires a less complicated process - a decoction of Avignon crystals with alum. Apply several layers, and polish the kid in the way indicated above. (Text. Manuf.)

Simple decoction of onion peel is said to produce upon glove leather an orange-yellow superior in lustre to any other.

It is also said to be suitable for mixing with light bark shades, especially willow-bark, and as a yellow for modulating browns. The onion dye is said to fix itself readily, even upon leathers which resist colours, and colours them well and evenly. (Chem. Mev.)

Glove-kids are dyed in 2 ways: - (1) The skins are plunged into the dye bath; in this way all light colours are ordinarily produced, such as pearl grey, straw yellow, reddish yellow, silver grey, aquamarine, etc. (2) The skins are spread on an inclined or round table of stone or metal, and brushed over on the grained side - first with a mordant, then with a dye liquor, and lastly with a solution of mineral salt. The mordant serves to fix the colour on the surface of the skin, to prevent its striking through, to produce certain modifications of colour, and to enable any parts of the skin which yet contain fat to take colour evenly with the rest. To satisfy these conditions, the composition of the mordant is varied. Bichromate of potash, ammonia, potash, soda, and stale urine are among the most frequently employed, seldom separately, but usually in a mixture containing 2 or more. Dyestuffs of vegetable origin have always held the first place. Those most in use are logwood, Brazil-wood, the 2 fustics, several species of willow bark and of berries, indigo carmine, and indigo dissolved in sulphuric acid. Aniline colours used alone remained in fashion for a short time only, but are now usefully employed as top colours - namely, brushed in very dilute solution over vegetable colours.

In this way particularly graceful shades of green, violet, and marine blue may be produced. After the mordant has been applied once or twice, and the colour 3 to 6 times, a wash containing some metallic salt is generally applied, with the object of either bringing out the special tone required, or of making the colour more lively and permanent. The so-called vitriols are mostly employed - "white vitriol" (zinc sulphate), and occasionally other salts. Before dyeing, the greater part of the flour, salt, and alum must be removed from the skins by washing with tepid water, and therefore they require a second treating with egg yolk and salt. In the case of skins which are dyed by plunging into the dye-vat, this is done after the dyeing is completed; in that of brush dyeing, before the dyeing process. After the dyeing, the skins, if dipped, are wrung out; if brush dyed, sleeked out with a brass plate, to get rid of superfluous water. They are then dried in an airy room. Before staking (stretching), the skins are laid or hung in a damp cellar, or in moist sawdust. They are staked twice - once damp, and once nearly dry. Skins which are much damaged on the grain, or otherwise faulty, are smoothed with lump pumice on the flesh side, either by hand or machine.

They are then dyed on this side, mostly by dipping, but occasionally with the brush, in which case the method described is slightly modified. (Spoils' Encyc.)