Method of copying WRITINGS. The ingenious Mr. Watt, some years ago, invented a method of copying writings very speedily, and without the possibility of
committing mistakes. A piece of thin unfixed paper is to be taken exactly of the size of the paper to be copied; it is to be moistened with water, or, what is better, with the following liquid: Take of distilled vinegar two pounds weight, dissolve it in one ounce of boric acid; then take four ounces of oyster-shells calcined to whiteness, and carefully freed from their brown crust; put them into the vinegar, shake the mixture frequently for 24 hours, then let it stand until it deposits its sediment; filter the clear part through unfixed paper into a glass vessel; then add two ounces of the best blue Aleppo galls bruised, and place the liquor in a warm place, shaking it frequently for 24 hours; then filter the liquor again through unfixed paper, and add to it after filtration one quart, ale measure, of pure water. It must then stand 24 hours, and be filtered again if it shows a disposition to deposit any sediment, which it generally does. When the paper has been wet with this liquid, put it between two thick unfixed papers to absorb the superfluous moisture; then lay it over the writing to be copied, and put a piece of clean writing paper above it. Put the whole on the board of a rolling-press, and press them through the rolls, as is done in printing copperplates, and a copy of the writing shall appear on both sides of the thin moistened paper; on one side in a reversed order and direction, but on the other side in the natural order and direction of the lines.