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be more regular in wr My own regiment having returned to this city, I hope to • more regular in writing to you hereafter, although we have Reeeived orders to draft our ranks full again, and stand ready to move at ten hours notice. thoroughly washed out, it usually made the developing liquid turbid. I found, by many comparative experiments, commenced nearly 3 years ago, that the use of bromide in about the same proportion which is now recommended by Mr. Sutton greatly accelerates dry collodion, and for 2 years I have used and recommended it, but I do not find that it gives nearly as much sensitiveness as can be obtained with wet collodion. Mr. Sutton’s theory that an equal number of atoms of iodine and bromine, gives the greatest sensitiveness, may very probably be right, but practically no great nicety is required, as little difference can be perceived in different proportions, between one part of bromide to two of iodide, and equal parts of each. I have generally used from two-thirds to three-fourths. Finding that the sensitiveness gained by the use of bromide was not so great as was desirable, I have been for a long time endeavouring to find means of increasing it, until very recently, with but little success, but at last have found a method of developing, which will bring out a picture after a much shorter exposure than usual, and which promises other advantages. As, however, nothing is easier than to make mistakes in such matters, I delay publishing the method, until there has been time to test it further, and to find out the best way of working. alcohol, and five parts water. I never use this bath a second time. When my prints are toned and washed, they are put into the alcohol and hypo, bath, where they do not change colour at all, as in the old fixing bath, but retain their bril liancy throughout. The whites are excessively clean, and the shadows very transparent. But you judge by the prints herewith. This is not the first instance where brass has passed for gold. It is an every-day occurrence, elsewhere than in the Photo’s chemical den. That dry-plate changing box I have in my possession, has done wonders on this side of the ocean, in converting old, and making new amateurs. Perhaps since Sellers has de scribed it so well, the English maker will recognise his work, and let us know him.* Such deserving ingenuity ought to be made public. More from me soon.—Yours respectfully, F. F. Thompson. MR. SUTTON’S RAPID DRY PROCESS. BY MAJOR BUSSELL. The process which Mr. Sutton described at the meeting of the British Association, is one with which I am quite familiar, as I worked a good deal with it between 2} and 3 years ago. It is doubtless a good method for some kinds of subjects, but, as far as I can judge from my own experience, it will scarcely justify Mr. Sutton’s sanguine expectation. A plate prepared with gum arabic is no doubt a trifle more sensitive than if tannin had been used on the same collodion. My principal reasons for preferring tannin for general use were the following :—■ It is difficult, when gum is used, to prevent loosening of the film ; a thin coating of india-rubber did not always produce sufficient adhesion, and a thicker coating was apt to crack when the negative was finished and dried ; a sub stratum of gelatine did not always answer; it was, therefore, necessary to use collodion in a particular condition, or to have a previous coating of coagulated albumen, which involved great trouble. I found the plates prepared with gum to pro duce most excellent results with great certainty, when the subject included little or no sky, but otherwise fogging or reddening all over the upper parts almost always appeared, especially when any objects were near and dark enough to re quire a rather long exposure. Again, if the gum was not PHOTOGRAPHY IN AMERICA. New Yorlt. October, 1th, 18G2. My Dear Sir,—I imagine you, as you see this letter among the rest on your morning table waiting to be opened, saying with a frown, “ Monsieur Tonson come again ! Con found that Thomson, he is an unreliable, irregular fellow, I wish we could depend on him or get rid of him.” All I can do is to doff my hat very meekly, and like a sorry school-boy, say “ I can’t help it.” We are in a very bad way this side of the Atlantic, my dear sir. We think no more of killing off five-thousand men per diem, for ten days at a stretch, than you would of lulling off red ants. Our President calls for a fresh million of men as coolly as be does for a dinner; and those who don’t volunteer, are drafted into the ranks, so it all ends the same. Our Congress passes tax laws that leave Old England away back in the shade. Our Secretaries issue paper money of all kinds without limit. A man having a gold coin, preserves it in his family as an ancient relic, and a silver half-dollar is a curiosity. But yet we all jog on, and of course, money being manufactured by the simple power of a thousand printing presses, we are richer, more prosperous, and busier than ever. We Yankees adapt ourselves to anything ; like the eels, we get used to being skinned. Some old fogy fellows look ahead, and say “ where are we drifting to T’ I acknow ledge I am one of the old fogy kind. We will quell rebellion vithout a doubt, but at what a cost! We will totally extinguish slavery, that curse of our country, but what seas of blood must be the element of purification. Every family in our land has a member in the army; every person can W1 you of a friend buried on the battle field, or what is '’orse, the Chickahominy swamp fever. Do you wonder vhen I say that photographic interest is somewhat drowned by the continual tramp ! tramp ! tramp ! of armed men, and the sharp rattle of the drums through our streets ? Do you blame me if I turn with disgust from amateur photography, rany other amusement, when I hear the now hourly sound of the muffled roll, and the solemn dead march, as the close Phtoons of soldiers with reversed arms, follow some gallant oficer to his last home ? IMPROVED APPARATUS—A FEW HINTS. BY JAMES L. LANE. Sir,—I have great pleasure in forwarding you the enclosed * Our correspondent will have learned ere this that the Englishman is found.— ED. Now about photography,—I enclose herewith a print by , T. Anthony ; it is one of the gems of the Club, and as a B4mple of the milk process fully sustains the superiority of bose plates. The vignetting of this picture is done in a Very simple and easy manner, by pasting on the back of the Negative several layers of white tissue paper, each one over- "pping the other towards the centre, and a whole piece over 1 H the rest. The general shading is finished with blue "ater-colour washed over the edges of the vignette with a "oftcamel’s hair brush; or this vignette can be made on a Plain piece of glass, and used to lay over the negative in Printing. This is the most convenient vignette I know of "I is worth a trial. a 1 also enclose a couple of my own pictures, to show you tew method of toning I have discovered. It is done by c usual alkaline gold bath. Having added to the soda (hution some nitrate of brass (if there be such a chemical), ant is to say, I dissolve some brass filings in nitric acid, I add this solution to my bi-carbonate of soda bottle, bl ° Acid is neutralized with great fermentation, and a clear 110 “quid is left. This I use with one half the usual flntity of chloride of gold, and a bath is the result which on128 almost instantaneously, and of a beautiful colour. 1 hatted bo state that I add a pinch of common salt to each of T Pint of toning bath, which seems to preserve the surface ‘“I/ 1 ''- paper cleaner. A half-grain of chloride of gold used 8 qay ^ one s ^ een stereo prints. ie fixing bath is : one part hypos, sodae, one part, 95°