be seen "at the farrier's adjoining the
Lyceum, in the Strand." Cranch is said to
have first tried his hand in this humble
department while standing before an oaken
chimney-piece; he took a red-hot poker out
of the fire, and scorched a rather bold and
effective design on the oaken panels. A good
Smith, we are told, will fetch a tolerable
price among the poker-admirers, in imitation
of collectors' prices in other and higher
walks of art. The scorching is effected by
any heated bar of iron; but in the best
specimens tools of various shapes are used,
to make some of the scorched lines narrower
and finer than others: the artist having,
literally, many irons in the fire at once. The
actual lines of the device are first pencilled
or drawn; the scorching is to produce the
shadows, the lighter tints being the result
of holding the red-hot iron very close to
the wood, but not quite touching. If the
panel have any strongly marked lines,
fibres, knots, eyes, curls, or other diversities
of grain, the artist sometimes avails
himself of these to produce pictorial effect,
scorching around or near them according
to circumstances. In one instance a knot
in the wood was made to represent the
eye in a portrait, by a few judicious
touches of the scorching-iron; while in
another case curled lines or grain-marks
were made available to represent the
furrows in an old man's cheek. The
artist, in fact, studies his panel, or should
do so.

Among the curiosities of this subject must
be included pictures made of straw. How
far patience is exercised in this direction at
present, we do not know; but in the last
century, the inmates of some of the French
monasteries employed a portion of their
time in such labours. The process was by
no means a simple one. First, a selection
was made of the whitest, thinnest, longest,
largest-barrel straws. They were severed
above and below all the knots; the knots,
membranes, and smaller parts of the straw
were removed; and the rest were retained
for use, in the form of thin, smooth,
unspotted cylinders of straw, sometimes six
or eight inches long. The straws were
damped, and split open by means of a
slender wooden spindle, which was inserted
at one end, and dexterously run along to
the other, making a straight rent throughout;
the brisk application of a burnisher
flattened out each piece. Sometimes, to
expedite their labour, the workers used a
kind of small flatting-mill, which first split
the straw and then opened it out flat. The
split and opened straws were dyed of
various colours, and were then pasted side
by side on small sheets of thin paper, forming
veritable sheets of straw, so accurately
cut and adjusted that the lines of junction
could scarcely be seen. All the straws on
one sheet were exactly of the same colour
and tint. These, then, were the materials
with which the artist worked; and the
mode of working depended on the kind of
effect desired to be produced. Sometimes
the sheets were cut up into very narrow
strips, and made into striped patterns, by
alternating the colours; sometimes the artists
in straw would make diagonal patterns,
and sometimes check patterns by crossing
the strips, or diversified patterns by
alternating broad with narrow strips. A
favourite but very tedious process was that
of making real straw mosaic. Several
sheets, of different colours, were placed one
on another, and cut completely through
with a delicate apparatus, in accordance
with some particular device; and then
ensued the slow work of pasting the tiny
bits side by side on paper, in the proper
arrangements of colour. Occasionally the
pictures or devices so produced were
embossed in relief, by being stamped between
a die of horn and a counterdie of thick
pasteboard: all the raised and depressed
parts of the device corresponding in a
proper way with the different colours of
the picture. And sometimes the artist
went so far as to engrave or chase the
straw, or even to work it up into a kind
of cameo.

Wool pictures, veritably such, are made
by some of the rug weavers in the North.
Variously-coloured threads of wool or
worsted are so placed in juxtaposition that
their loose ends form a kind of plush or
velvet picture, which may represent a
portrait or any other design. The
apparatus for effecting this is, however, very
complex.

There is a kind of double-faced equivocal
picture often in favour, intended to please
through the medium of surprise. Look at
it frontwise, and it presents the face of a
beautiful girl; look at it obliquely from one
side, and a wrinkled old hag is the portrait
before you. There are many ways of doing
this. On one plan a kind of venetian-blind
is made, with the parallel pieces meeting,
but not overlapping; one picture is painted
on the front, another on the back; a series
of cords give a sudden half-revolution to
all the strips, making one picture follow
the other with surprising quickness.