21 MAY 1881, Page 3

The Americans are beating us again. This time, they have

invented a pencil which will make an indelible mark. The load in the pencil is not plumbago, but a composition ; it writes as easily as a pencil, and after a few seconds, the writing cannot be effaced. There is no fluid used, no scraping needed, and the pencil will write on for months unchanged. The defect of the in- vention is that the composition, as yet, writes in purple, instead of black. When that has been removed, which seems easy, the American " ink leads " will, we imagine, completely supersede every kind of pen and ink. The power of writing with an in- strument which needs no apparatus, and can be carried as easily as any pencil-case, is practically invaluable.