the Mechanism or manner of proceeding in this operation; which, as I have
been inform'd, is no other then this.

They double all the Stuff that is to be water'd, that is, they crease it
just through the middle of it, the whole length of the piece, leaving the
right side of the Stuff inward, and placing the two edges, or silvages just
upon one another, and, as near as they can, place the wale so in the
doubling of it, that the wale of the one side may lie very near parallel,
or even with the wale of the other; for the nearer that posture they lie,
the greater will the watering appear; and the more obliquely, or across to
each other they lie, the smaller are the waves. Their way for folding it
for a great wale is thus: they take a Pin, and begin at one side of the
piece in any wale, and so moving it towards the other side, thereby direct
their hands to the opposite ends of the wale, and then, as near as they
can, place the two opposite ends of the same wale together, and so double,
or fold the whole piece, repeating this enquiry with a Pin at every yard or
two's distance through the whole length; then they sprinkle it with water,
and fold it the longways, placing between every fold a piece of Pastboard,
by which means all the wrong side of the water'd Stuff becomes flat, and
with little wales, and the wales on the other side become the more
protuberant; whence the creasings or angular bendings of the wales become
the more perspicuous. Having folded it in this manner, they place it with
an interjacent Pastboard into an hot Press, where it is kept very violently
prest, till it be dry and stiff; by which means, the wales of either
contiguous sides leave their own impressions upon each other, as is very
manifest by the second Figure, where 'tis obvious enough, that the wale of
the piece ABCD runs parallel between the pricked lines ef, ef, ef, and as
manifest to discern the impressions upon these wales, left by those that
were prest upon them, which lying not exactly parallel with them, but a
little athwart them, as is denoted by the lines of, oooo, gh, gh, gh,