Several makers produce coloured handmade papers suitable for end papers. Machine-made papers can be had in endless variety from any number of makers.
The paper known as "Japanese Vellum" is a very tough material, and will be found useful for repairing vellum books; the thinnest variety of it is very suitable for mending the backs of broken sections, or for strengthening weak places in paper.
The following delightful account of paper making by hand is quoted from "Evelyn's Diary, 1641-1706."
"I went to see my Lord of St. Alban's house at Byflete, an old large building. Thence to the paper mills, where I found them making a coarse white paper. They cull the raggs, which are linnen, for white paper, woollen for brown, then they stamp them in troughs to a papp with pestles or hammers like the powder-mills, then put it into a vessell of water, in which they dip a frame closely wyred with a wyre as small as a haire, and as close as a weaver's reede; on this they take up the papp, the superfluous water draining thro' the wyre; this they dextrously turning, shake out like a pancake on a smooth board between two pieces of flannell, then press it between a greate presse, the flannell sucking out the moisture; then taking it out they ply and dry it on strings, as they dry linnen in the laundry; then dip it in alum-water, lastly polish and make it up in quires. They put some gum in the water in which they macerate the raggs. The mark we find on the sheets is formed in the wyre."
The following are the more usual sizes of printing papers--
Foolscap 17 × 13½ Crown 20 × 15 Post 19¼ × 15½ Demy 22½ × 17½ Medium 24 × 19 Royal 25 × 20 Double Pott 25 × 15 " Foolscap 27 × 17 Super Royal 27 × 21 Double Crown 30 × 20 Imperial 30 × 22 Double Post 31½ × 19½
The corresponding sizes of hand-made papers may differ slightly from the above.
Although the above are the principal sizes named, almost any size can be made to order.
The following is an extract from the report of the Committee of the Society of Arts on the deterioration of paper, published in 1898: "The committee find that the paper-making fibres may be ranged into four classes:--
A. Cotton, flax, and hemp. B. Wood, celluloses (_a_) sulphite process, and (_b_) soda and sulphate process. C. Esparto and straw celluloses. D. Mechanical wood pulp.