Cloth.
（Fabric.) A woven fabric of cotton, linen, or wool. Silk perhaps hardly comes within the category. See fabric for list of woven goods. Woolen cloth, after weaving, is subjected to the following processes: — Braying or scouring: that is, washing in troughs with heavy mallets, water and detergents being used to remove the oil and all acquired filth. Burling: picking off the knots made by the weaver. Milling or fulling: to felt the fibers of the cloth closer together, increasing the compactness of the fabric and the finish of the face. See Fullingmill. Dressing: this is done by teasels, whose hooked ends bring the loose fibers to the surface to form a nap. See teaseling; dressing. Shearing: the filaments drawn out by the teasels are shorn or singed to a length. See cloth-shearing machine. Pressing: the cloth is arranged in regular folds and subjected to hydrostatic pressure. A polished pressing-board is placed between each fold. See cloth-press. Some of the later processes of the cloth-manufacture are varied or combined. Hot-pressing, boiling, steaming, are each of them means for giving a fine finish by the application of heat. Picking is a process of removing blemishes by tweezers, or coloring faulty spots by a hair-pencil and dye. Fine-drawing is closing minute holes or faults in the fabric, by inserting sound yarns by means of a needle. Marking consists in working — in with white or yellow silk a word or mark indicating the quality of the piece. Baling and packing conclude the series of processes.
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| Cloth-creaser. |
