Encyclopedia article on the bleaching of textile fibres, covering the history from antiquity and the Dutch and Scottish bleachfields to the introduction of chlorine, eau de Javel and Tennant's bleaching powder. It then describes industrial practice for cotton yarn and piece goods, linen, jute and straw, including the kier boiling, souring and chemicking steps. Engraved figures show dash-wheels, singeing stoves, kiers, washing machines, the Mather kier and a horizontal drying machine.

A popular 1874 magazine article on the history of cotton manufacture, written for Harper's series on the first century of the United States. It traces cotton from antiquity and its arrival in Europe and America through the cotton gin, carding, and the spinning machines of Hargreaves, Arkwright and Crompton (jenny, water frame, mule). It then covers the power loom, the Jacquard attachment, and calico printing and dyeing, with engravings of the main machines.

Two pages from the 11th edition of Encyclopedia Britannica covering the end of the article on indigo. They describe processing of the natural indigo mud (mal) and the composition of natural indigoes, along with British import values of natural and synthetic indigo for 1899-1908. The rest is the chemistry of indigotine: the work of Baeyer and Heumann, the industrial synthesis from naphthalene, its properties, indigo white and indigo carmine, halogen derivatives, Tyrian purple as a dibromindigo, and thioindigo dyes.