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To dye woollens red, crimson, and scarlet

Coarse woollen stuffs are dyed red with madder or archil: but fine cloth is almost exclusively dyed with cochineal, though the colour which it receives from kermes, is much more durable. Brazil-wood is scarcely used, except as an auxiliary, because the colour which is imparts to wool, is not permanent. Wool is dyed crimson, by first impregnating it with alumine, by means of an alum bath, and then boiling it in a decoction of cochineal, till it has acquired the wished-colour. The crimson will be finer, if the tin-mordant is substituted for alum; indeed, it is usual with dyers, to add a little nitromuriate of tin, when they want fine crimsons. The addition of archil and potass to the cochineal, both renders the crimson darker, and gives it more bloom; but the bloom very soon vanishes. For paler crimsons, one-half of the cochineal is withdrawn, and madder substituted in its place. Wool may be dyed scarlet, by first boiling it in a solution of murio-sulphate of tin, then dying it pale yellow with quercitron bark, and afterwards crimson with cochinel; for scarlet is a compound colour, consisting of crimson mixed with a little yellow.