Ian Lancaster took me back there. When I first cleaned windows for a living in 1958 I had never seen a squeegee, it was all done with a chamois mop and damp scrim. The scrim had to be washed after about 4 houses, and in clean water too, we had segs on our hands from ringing them out.
The crack when you flicked them was like a whip, it frayed the corners of the scrim pretty quickly too.
I was the fly killing champion, if a fly or wasp landed near by, I could atomise it with one deft flick.
You had to use the old linen scrims damp, as soon as they became dry,they would start leaving fluff on the glass, the new ones did anyway.
The difference I have noticed with modern scrim is that well used scrim will start fluffing too. The old stuff never did this, in fact they seemed to get better with use, and a holey scrim was quite prized.
We use to go over the glass with the mop, and then scrim it right away. This left a slight film of water on the glass, but only for a second and it always dried perfectly.
If the glass wasn't too dirty, you could get away with using a damp scrim only. It made the job a lot quicker even if you did have to wash it more often.
I was thinking about this the other day when Terry was on about his magic solution, if he has found micro fiber as good as the old scrim, the clean water would be the only magic solution you would ever need.