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Damascus Steel.—According to Demmin,* the treatment of steel known as "damaskeening" is no longer practised at Damascus. The metal used is a cast steel, in which-a strongly marked figuration is produced by the presence of crystallised graphite, which is rendered evident by the corrosive action of acids. In 1804 Clouth imitated the oriental Damascus steel, and Stodart and Faraday considerably improved the process of manufacture. At the present time artificial polished Damascus steel is largely made in France, whence it is exported to the East. It is also made for gun barrels at Liege, and for swords at Solingen and Passau. There are black, brown, and yellow damaskeenings, which are produced in the following manner :—Several bars of steel of different hardness, or of iron, cast steel, and steel, are welded together, hardened, and formed into sword blades. They are then treated with acids, where by the harder portions acquire a dark colour, whilst the softer portions remain bright.

The figurations appear wavy, striped, or mosaic-like, according to the manner in which the various bars were hammered together. The finest and most expensive variety is said to be the Liege Eenard damaskeening, which is formed of three bars welded together, each of which consists of seventy-two iron and seventy-two steel wires. The gun barrel is formed by smithing this compound bar, which is wound round an iron cylinder placed over a mandril. When finished, the iron cylinder is drilled out.

An imitation of damaskeening, which is used in Liege for cheap
sporting guns, is produced by affixing paper printed in lithographic ink on the surface of the finished iron or steel gun barrel, and into this dilute sulphuric acid is poured, which corrodes the portions of the barrel not protected by the ink on the paper. Ou heating the gun barrel, blue and brown colorations are produced
Bery- und Hüttenmännische Zeitung, vol. xlviii. p. 8. 1889.—i.

It is said that the Persians distinguish by ten different names the varieties
of watering. One of the most prized and rare is that which takes its name
from the grains of yellow sand. There are, however, four main patterns
generally recognised :—
1. " Kirk narduban," meaning the forty steps or rungs of the laduer, in
allusion to the transverse markings of fine grey or black watering. The idea
is also expressed in an inscription on one of the blades, that the undulations
of the steel resemble a net across running water.

2. " Qará khorásán," nearly black, with fine undulations proceeding like
water either from the point to the hilt, or the reverse way.

3. Qará Tábán, " brilliant black," with larger watering and more grey in
tone.

4. Sham, or simple Damascus, including all other varieties.1
On the introduction of the use of firearms, the methodss long and perhaps
exclusively known to the Asiatics, of manufacturing sword-blades of peculiar
excellence, was transferred with' some modification to that of gun-barrels, and
are still in use.2

In Persia, Kabul, the Punjab, and Hind the same general principles prevail,
but the matchlocks of the last are held deservedly in the highest estimation.

In some parts of India the workmen prefer for the material of their barrels
the iron of old sugar boilers, but they use in Kashmir the iron of Bajaur (in
the country of the Yusufzai) as it comes from the smelting furnace, after
receiving a few blows whilst hot, which condense it into a rude kind of pig, the
weight of which varies from five to eight seers (10 to 16 Ibs.), and which sells
as high as 4d. a pound. The first process consists in cutting the pig when
heated into narrow strips witli a cold chisel, and in this operation the iron
loses one-fourth of its gross weight. Each of these strips separately is
brought to welding heat, and worked smartly under the hammers of two men
on a block of limestone as an anvil. When the slag is expelled, each strip is
drawn out by the hammer into a strap about 2 feet long and 11/5 inch broad,
and 1/5th inch thick. One of these straps has its ends so brought together as
to enable it to include about 20 other short straps cut up for the purpose,
some being placed on their edge, and others wedged in between the lengths,
во as to form a compact mass. It is then put into the fire and lightly heated,
receiving a few blows upon both faces as well as upon the edges.

It is next smeared over with a paste of clay and water, and when dried it
is exposed first to a light welding heat, and after a slight hammering to a
stronger heat, when it is vigorously and quickly beaten into four-sided bars
1 Cat. Mus. Zarkoe-Seloe,
p. 242. In addition to those, Sir Л. Burnes mentions " Akbaree,"
in which the pattern ran like a skein of silk the whole length of the Made, and " Beguraee,"
where it waved like a watered silk. '-
Moorcroft's Travels, p. 195. 1841.

about a foot long, and a finger's thickness. These are again heated, separated,
and drawn out into square rods about J-inch broad on each face. These are
then twisted from right to left, while the part which is to be twisted is heated
to a red heat nearly verging upon white. This process is repeated by heating
two or three inches at a time, and then cooling it with cold water, till the
whole rod is converted into a fine screw, which is made as even as possible.

To make an Iran barrel six or eight rods are required. When eight are
employed, four of them have the twist from right to left, and four from left
to right. Every rod after having been slightly heated is lightly hammered
on its two opposite sides equally, so that two sides have the threads beaten
down, and the two others have the threads standing, and retaining their
original roundness. Each rod is now made up of lengths of the same
direction of twist, and is laid parallel to the other, so that rods of opposite
twist are in alternate succession.1

The steel having been formed into bars is now ready for manufacture into
gun-barrels.2

The extremities of the bars are welded together, and the baud or skelp is
now ready for being formed into a hollow cylinder through being twisted
in a spiral line upon itself, which is begun at the breech or thicker end, and
continued to the muzzle. When the twisting is so far completed that the
edges of all the twists stand even, and the cylinder is nearly equal, it is coated
with a thin paste of clay and water, and is then ready for being welded.

A welding heat is first taken in the middle of the cylinder, and the edges
of the twists are brought together by the breech being struck down upon the
stone anvil perpendicularly for the purpose of jumping up the edges. The
welding is constantly repeated, so that the twist, which was jumped up, is
successively hammered when the heat is well on, till the barrel has been
welded up to the muzzle.

This process is then repeated, commencing from the middle to the breech,
and afterwards from the middle to the muzzle, during which an iron rod is
introduced at each end and tised as a mandril. A third heat nearly red is
now taken at the whole surface of the barrel, which is then made regular and
level by smartly hammering it. The barrel is then fixed horizontally through
a hole in an upright post and bored, after which its surface is filed, polished,
and prepared for bringing out the damasked lines. " Jauhar " is brought
out through biting the whole surface with " kasis," a sulphate of iron.

The barrel is completely freed from grease or oil by being well rubbed with
dry ashes and a clean rag. About three drachms of sulphate of iron in powder
is mixed with as much water as is sufficient to bring it to the consistence of
thick paste which is smeared equally over the whole surface of the barrel, the
nmzzle and breech being at the same time carefully plugged. About two
hours afterwards, when the metal has assumed a blackish colour, the coating
is rubbed oft', and the barrel cleaned as before.
1 Barrels
arc called " pechdár " when plain or simply twisted, "jnulmrdár " tvheu dunmsked.
For the latter the rods are disposed according to the kind of brilliant or damasked lines to be
produced, called either from the country as " Iran " or Persian, or from the figure, as " pigeon's
eye," " lover's knot," " chain," &c.
s Cf. Joiirn. Asiatic Soc. 1841,
p. 83.; Mooreroft, II., 195, 213,

The barrel is then smeared with a preparation composed of the same
quantity of sulphate of iron and four ounces of water, and is hung up in the
well.

Every gunsmith has, in the floor of his shop, a well about two yards deep,
the bottom of which is covered with a layer of fresh horse-dung half a yard
thick. Suspended by a string from the cross stick at the mouth of the well,
the barrel which has been covered with the mixture as before is taken out
every morning and cleaned with dry ashes and cloth, and hung up for 24
hours with a coating of the solution. This process is continued for 20 days
or a month till prominent lines are formed on the surface of the barrel,
separated from each other more or less by other depressed lines or grooves ;
the former will be found to have the same direction as that of the thread of
the screw in the twisted rods. The prominent lines when rubbed are bright
and of a colour somewhat approaching silver, while the depressed lines are
dark and form the pattern.

The " zanjir " or chain damask consists in the introduction of a band of
prominent and brilliant lines disposed like the links of a chain between
parallel plain lines of damask. The processes are the same as before described
in cutting up the " pig," and in reducing the strips into straps, but the " pie "
or " ghilaf " contains only eight lengths, which when welded is drawn out into
straps 1/2 inch broad and 1/8 inch thick. One of these straps being heated is
bent backwards and forwards upon itself in eight continued loops, each an
inch long, and is then worked up into straps 1/3 inch broad, and 1/16 inch thick.
Three of this kind of strap are required in this pattern, one for the chain and
two for the lines. The face of the iron anvil has a perpendicular hollow
about one-quarter of an inch deep, and about one-third of an inch across.
One end of the strap is laid while cold across this groove, and driven down
into it by a small chisel and hammer, by which the strap receives a bend or
angle. Its opposite face is then placed across the die near the acute elbow
made by the chisel, and is in like manner wedged into it, after which the
operation is reversed until the whole band is converted into a frill of loops.
This frill is then heated, and the operator holding one end with a small pair of
tongs brings two pairs of loops together leaving the ends open. This is
continued till the frill is much reduced in length through the loops of the
strap standing at right angles to its general direction. Different lengths of
frill are welded together, so as to form a ribbon six spans long, placed in
contact with two plain straps set on edge, and four rods, two on each side
twisting alternately, from left to right, and the reverse. The general band of
these seven straps is then treated as that for the " Irani " damask.

The chain damask is in general preferred to all other varieties, excepting
the silver twist. The Kashmiris still make blades for daggers in the same
way, as one which was made for the author at Srinagar to fit an Indian
jade handle is damasked, and Moorcroft relates that they made sword blades
for him to order, though they did not usually manufacture them. It is said
that " jauhar " is imitated in Hindostán by lines being traced in a coating
of wax laid over the metal, and the barrel being exposed to the action of
sulphate of iron.

The Barrels thus manufactured with good charcoal iron proved to be already a great progress with respect to solidity, but offered of the Damascus appearance which was visible by certain traces of the spiral produced by the appearance of the fibres or the varnish of the metal....

....almost like the designs on our hanging papers in our rooms, with the only difference, that in these the variety is produced by the colours on the surface, whilst the figures on the Damascus are produced by the substance or material like the designs or patterns in our linnen-weavers.