Note 25 — A CYCLOPÆDIA OF PRACTICAL RECEIPTS, &c. VOLUME II (continued 8)

The original ‘LUCIFERS,’ or ‘LIGHT-BEARING MATCHES,’ invented in 1826, consisted of strips of pasteboard, or flat splints of wood, tipped first with sulphur, and then with a mixture of sulphide of antimony and chlorate of potassa, and were ignited by drawing them briskly through folded glass-paper. They required a considerable effort to ignite them, and the composition was apt to be torn off by the violence of the friction. The term ‘lucifer’ having become familiar, was applied to the simpler and more effective match afterwards introduced under the names of ‘CONGREVE’ and ‘CONGREVE LIGHT,’