Part 1. Further Characteristics of Wheat and Potato-Starch

Part 1. Further Characteristics of wheat and potato-starch are the following:      

Wheat starch is less hygroscopic than potato starch since the former contains in the sir-dried state but 12 to 14 percent., the latter, however 16 to 18 percent. Of water, which it will reabsorb from the sir, even if has been dried very carefully.

The specific gravity of both kinds of starch is exactly the same, to wit, 1.53. In many cases, the great difference in the diameter of the single starch-granules will explain the origin of the starch.

    The stiffening power of wheat-starch is greater than that of potato-starch, and for this reason it is preferred for stiffening linen and washed clothes as well as for making bookbinders’s paste. In the paste the starch granules are contained in the form of gelatinous lumps, which in the potato-starch are much larger than in wheat-starch; this cause the trouble that the textiles. Having been stiffened with potato-starch, while being smoothed (or ironed) will not look so well, as the hot iron sometimes shoves off these miniature lumps, or balls them together, which never occurs when wheat starch is used. The paste of wheat starch exposed to be the air remains unaltered for a long time, while potato-starch paste, after but a few days, separates a gelatinous mass, after but a days, separates e gelatinous mass, over which an aqueous and somewhat sour liquid forms. The mass mixed again by stirring with  this liquid no longer possesses the same sticky nature which the fresh paste had. Wheat starch is therefore preferable to potato starch, and would have long since supplanted the latter entirely, if the former were as white and pure and as cheap as potato starch.