§ V. Composition of colours, to dye skins or gloves.

Valuable Secrets concerning Arts and Trades:
or Approved Directions, from the best Artists, for the Various Methods...
Printed by Thomas Hubbard,
Norwich, 1795Chap. V. Secrets concerning colours & painting.

§ V. Composition of colours, to dye skins or gloves.


XLIII. A lively Isabel.

To make a lively Isabel colour, you must, to a quantity of white, add one half of yellow, and two thirds of red and yellow.


XLIV. For the same, paler.

If to a quantity of white, you put only one half of yellow, and another half of red, you shall have an Isabel of a paler hue than the first.


XLV. For a pale filbert colour.

1. Take burnt umber; a little yellow, very little white, and still less red.

2. This is made darker, only by adding to it a quantity of burnt umber as much yellow; a little white, and as much red.

3. Its darkness is still increased, if, putting no white at all to the umber you add only some black chalk, a little yellow, and as much red.


XLVI. For an amber colour.

To make an amber colour; to much yellow, you add very little white, and no more red than white.


XLVII. For the gold colour.

To much yellow, join a little more red; and this mixture will give you a very fine bright gold colour.


XLVIII. For the flesh colour.

To imitate well the complexion, or flesh colour, you mix a little white and yellow together, then add a little more red than yellow.


XLIX. The straw colour.

Much yellow; very little white; as little red, and a great deal of gum.


L. A fine brown.

1. Burnt umber; much black chalk; a little black, and a little red, will make a fine brown, when well in corporated together.

2. The same is made paler, by decreasing the quantity of black chalk, and no black at all in the above composition.


LI. To make a fine musk colour.

Take burnt umber; very little black chalk; little red and little white. These ingredients well mixed will produce as fine a musk colour as ever was.


LII. To make a Frangipane colour.

1. This is made with a little umber; twice as much, red, and three times as much yellow.

2. The paler hue of it is obtained by adding only some white, and making the quantity of red equal to that of yellow.


LIII. An Olive colour.

To make the olive colour, take umber, not burnt; a little yellow; and the quarter part of it of red and yellow.


LIV. For the Wainscot colour.

Much yellow; little white; little umber; and of red half the quantity of yellow.


LV. How to make Skins and Gloves take these Dyes.

Grind the colours you have pitched upon with perfumed oil of jessamine, or orange flowers. Then range the grinded colour on a corner of the marble stone. Grind, of gum-adragant, an equal quantity as that of the colours, soaking it all the while with orange flower water. Then grind both the gum and the colour together, in order to incorporate them well. - Put all into a pan, and pour a discretionabie quantity of water over it, to dilute sufficiently your paste. Then with a brush, rub your gloves or skins over with this tinged liquor, and hang them in the air to dry. When dry, rub them with a stick. Give them again, with the same brush, another similar coat of the same dye, and hang them again to dry. When dry for this second time, you may dress them, the colour is sufficiently fixed, and there is no fear of its ever coming off.


LVI. To varnish a Chimney.

Blacken it first with black and size. When this coat is dry, lay another of white lead over it, diluted in mere sized water. This being dry also, have verdigrise diluted and grinded with oil of nuts and a coarse varnish, and pass another coat of this over the white.