throwing themselves. Now, with arms extended,
they pushed the plates to one verge of the
low tables, stretching their bodies as far as
possible; then, drawing back, they stood
erect, pulling the plate after them; then,
in order to reach the opposite edge of the
plane, they stretched themselves out again
to an almost horizontal posture. The easy
beauty of their movements, the glitter of the
glass, the brilliancy of the gaslights, the bright
colours of most of the dresses, formed a coup
d'œil which Mr. Bossle enjoyed a great deal
more than Mrs. Bossle, had she been there,
might have quite approved.

The fairy scene is soon, however, to disappear.
Mr. Blake, the ingenious manager of
the works, has invented an artificial female
hand, by means of which, in combination with
peculiar machinery, glass smoothing can be
done by steam. The last process is "polishing."
This art is practised in a spacious
room glowing with red. Every corner of the
busy interior is as rubicund as a Dutch dairy.
The floor is red, the walls are red, the ceiling
is red, the pillars are red, the machinery is
very red. Red glass is attached, by red
plaster of Paris, to red moveable tables; red
rubbers of red felt, heavily weighted with red
leads, are driven rapidly over the red surface.
Little red boys, redder than the reddest of
Red Indians, are continually sprinkling on
the reddened glass, the rouge (moistened
crocus, per oxyde of iron), which converts the
scene of their operations into the most
gigantic of known Rubrics.

When polished, the glass is taken away to
be "examined." A body of vigilant scrutineers
place each sheet between their own
eyes and a strong light: wherever a scratch
or flaw appears, they make a mark with a
piece of wax. If removable, these flaws are
polished out by hand. The glass is then ready
for the operation, which enables "the beauty
to behold herself." The spreading of the
quicksilver at the back is, however, a separate
process, accomplished elsewhere, and
performed by a perfectly distinct body of
workmen. It is a very simple art.

The manufacture of plate-glass adds another
to the thousand and one instances of the
advantages of unrestricted and unfettered trade.
The great demand occasioned by the immediate
fall in price consequent upon the New Tariff,
produced this effect on the Thames Plate
Glass Works—They now manufacture as
much plate-glass per week as was turned out
in the days of the Excise, in the same time, by
all the works in the country put together.
The Excise incubi clogged the operations
of the workmen, and prevented every sort of
improvement in the manufacture. They put
their gauges into the "metal" (or mixed
materials) before it was put into the pot.
They overhauled the paste when it was taken
out of the fire, and they applied their foot-rules
to the sheets after the glass was annealed. The
duty was collected during the various stages of
manufacture half-a-dozen times, and amounted
to three hundred per cent. No improvement
was according to law, and the Exciseman put
his veto upon every attempt of the sort. In the
old time, the mysterious mixer could not have
exercised his secret vocation for the benefit of
his employers, and the demand for glass
was so small that Mr. Blake's admirable
polishing machine would never have been
invented. Nor could plate glass ever have
been used for transparent flooring, or for door
pannels, or for a hundred other purposes, to
which it is now advantageously and
ornamentally applied.

Thanking the courteous gentleman who had
shown us over the works, we left Mr. Bossle
in close consultation with the Manager.
As, in crossing the yard, we heard the word
"soda!" frequently thundered forth, we
concluded that the Johnsonian dry-salter was
endeavouring to complete some transaction in
that commodity, which he had previously
opened with the director. But, it is not in
our power to report decisively on this head,
for our attention was directed to two
concluding objects.

First, to a row of workmen—the same we
had lately seen among the fires and liquid
glass—good-humouredly sitting, with perfect
composure, on a log of timber, out in the cold
and wet, looking at the muddy creek, and
drinking their beer, as if there were no such
thing as temperature known. Secondly, and
lastly, to the narrow passages or caves underneath
the furnaces, into which the glowing
cinders drop through gratings. These looked,
when we descended into them, like a long
Egyptian street on a dark night, with a fiery
rain falling. In warm divergent chambers
and crevices, the boys employed in the works
love to hide and sleep, on cold nights. So
slept DE FOE'S hero, COLONEL JACK, among
the ashes of the glass-house where he worked.
And that, and the river together, made us
think of ROBINSON CRUSOE the whole way
home, and wonder what all the English boys
who have been since his time, and who are
yet to be, would have done without him and
his desert Island.

A GUILD CLERK'S TALE.

The office of clerk of the Carvers' Company
has been filled by members of my family
for one hundred years past. My great-grandfather
was elected in the year 1749. After
him, came his younger brother; and, when
he died, my grandfather was chosen by nine
votes out of twelve; after that, all opposition
vanished. Our dynasty was established.
When my grandfather died, my father went
through the ceremony of calling upon the
members of the Court of Assistants, and
soliciting their votes; and, afterwards, the
formality of a show of hands being passed, he
was declared, as every one knew he would be
who was aware of the existence of the