Part 78. Coloring matters of some sort are almost universally present throughout the vegetable kingdom. In many cases they can scarcely be supposed to be of any benefit to the plant which produces them but must be regarded as merely waste products of the plant's activity. This is very commonly true of the vegetable coloring matters used in the industrial and the fine arts as dyestuffs, pigments, inks, or the like. Such substances have been used from the remotest antiquity. In recent times, however, vegetable dyestuffs have come to be very largely replaced by various artificial compounds such as the well-known aniline dyes prepared by chemists from coal-tar. From among the vegetable pigments and dyestuffs that are still of importance in the arts gamboge, indigo, logwood, lampblack, and tan-bark may be selected as typical and familiar examples.

Lampblack

Lampblack is the finely divided carbon deposited from the smoke of rosin or oil burned with slight access of air in a special chamber. It is used extensively in the making of printing-ink, and forms the basis of india-ink and of various black pigments used in painting, leather-finishing, and the like. Lampblack is one of the most important of coloring matters.