Gutta percha, its discovery, history, and manifold uses.

Date:
1851
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Gutta percha, its discovery, history, and manifold uses. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    tlie rude image of a duck, with two little red berries for eyes. And a very good idea, we may add, was given by it, of the way in which the form of the aquatic bird suggested the primitive canoe. Depress the back, elevate and point the tail, incurve the body; and the art of shipbuilding is begun. Representations of fish, again are not uncommon; and one lump was sent over in the semblance of a baby’s head. In these instances, however, art, like virtue, must be its own reward, as the blocks, whatever their form, are sold 'without distinction by weight. This fact, we are sorry to say, has occasioned another kind of “ cunning¬ ness” in the Malays ; and some of the lowest tricks of trade have already become naturalized in savage life. A stone, for example, will be frequently im¬ bedded in the centre of the mass, to add to its weight! It is of course impossible to detect the imposition, unless, indeed, the stone should be ver render the block un The mischief of the matter is not so much that the barba¬ rians get a trifle more than their due, but that the machinery of the Grutta Percha Company is liable to be seriously injured; the keen blade that shears through the Gutta being often notched or broken, by striking upon the stone. This petty knavery, which we hope the Malays did not learn from Englishmen, is thus a constant source of vexation and expense. The chemical composition of pure Gutta Percha has been ascertained by Dr. Maclaghan as follows :— Carbon ..... 86'36 Hydrogen . . . . . I2T5 Oxygen ..... I'49 - 100. A result almost identical with Dr. Earaday’s analysis of Caout¬ chouc, viz.:— Carbon ...... 87‘2 Hydrogen ..... I2'8 100. ^ large, so as to usually heavy. Fig. 4. Block with Stone in the Centre. f
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