about four tons of the largest size commonly
made—six inches long—and sixteen tons of
other sizes, descending to the little tack which
measures only three-sixteenths of an inch.
No one can tell precisely how many are made
in the kingdom, because there are numerous
small manufacturers in the inland towns,
whose sales are not ascertainable. But it is
supposed that Birmingham alone may supply
two hundred tons a week; and the whole
kingdom, perhaps, five hundred tons. Now
let the imagination follow this;—let us think
of a handful of tacks, or the household box of
nails, and follow these up to the pound, and
the hundred-weight, and the twenty hundred-weights
which make a ton, and think of five
hundred of these tons, as a weekly supply;
and we shall be full of wonder as to what
becomes of such heaps of uncountable masses
of nails.

The fact is, we send them very far over the
world: even to Australia, where they are
wanted in large quantities by the growing
people there, who are always building more
and more houses, and edifices of other kinds.
We send vast quantities to the German ports,
whence they spread over the interior of the
continent. Canada is too near the United
States to need any supply from us; and,
indeed, there is nail-making going on at
Montreal, which nearly satisfies the wants of
that colony.

The sheets of iron brought as material to the
establishment which we saw at Birmingham
are six feet in length and two in width. These
have to be cut into strips. The strips must
not be cut the long way of the sheet, because
that would bring the grain of the iron (for
even iron has a grain) the wrong way for the
nail, and a bad article would be produced,
as surely as the wrist-bands of a shirt would
look ill, and soon wear out, if they were cut
the wrong way of the linen. As the nails are
cut across the strip of iron, the strip must be
cut across the sheet. Thus, it is clear the
nails will be cut from the long way of the
sheet.

As for the width of the strip, it must be
somewhat more than the length of the nail,
because the head must be allowed for. The
longest nail that has been made in these
machines is one of nine inches. A strip which
is to make inch nails, must be an inch and
one-eighth in width. It is a marvellous thing
to see the cutting of these strips, which might
seem to be thin pasteboard, but for the noise
they make in falling. The hidden steam-engine
turns the wheels of the shearing-machine.
The iron plate is held to it, the
edge put into a grove, and off comes the strip,
as quick as thought. It is, in fact, cut from
end to end, and not struck off with one blow;
but the process is too rapid for the eye to
follow—the machine making fifty revolutions
in a minute. Thus, these iron ribbons are
rained down at the rate of nearly one, every
second of time.

Now we have the strips. How many nails
will each yield? The number that must be
got is two hundred and forty small tacks, or,
if of the six-inch size, one hundred and twenty;
the other sizes ranging between. It would
be impossible to get this number, if one edge
of the strip was to yield all the heads, and the
other edge all the points. There would be
much fewer nails, and a great waste of iron.
The strip must be turned for the cutting of
each nail, that the slope made by cutting the
narrow part of the last, may serve for the
broad edge of the next. This incessant turning
of the strip is the one thing which the workman
has to do. His machine actually does all
the rest, and without failure or pause. Before
each machine stands a rest—a good deal like
what soldiers used to carry in the days of
matchlocks, to rest their pieces on. It is like
a large two-pronged fork set on end, prongs
uppermost, and moveable in its socket. Taking
hold of his strip of cold iron with a pair of
long pincers, very like tongs, the boy lodges
it across this fork, and proceeds to feed the
machine with the metal which it is rapidly to
digest into nails. A most vigorous and
certain process of digestion it is. There is a
sharp steel tooth at what may be called the
mouth of the machine, the ledge on which the
strip is laid. The tooth doubles back, like
the fang of a rattlesnake, and, in doing so, it
allows a sharp blade to fall, and slice off a
nail. While the boy is turning the strip, the
severed bit drops into a groove, where a pair
of nippers seizes it by the point, and another
advances from behind to strike and hold the
shank. The point and shank being thus
formed and held fast, a hammer conies on,
driven from the right hand, to form the head.
The severe blow which forms the head,
releases the point and shank, and the finished
nail slides down an inclined plain into a trough
below. This process of forming the nail goes
on in the dark—in a space below the cutting
apparatus—in the stomach to which the mouth
has sent down the aliment. But never was
such quick digestion known in any kind of
stomach, for it is empty between the mouthfuls.
While the boy is turning his strip, and
the blade is cutting it, the nail is dismissed
from the groove—finished, head and point;
but only finished as to form. It has still to be
annealed;—that is, to be roasted, baked, stoned,
—call it what you will. The nails are shovelled
into square iron pans, with a chemical mixture,
and thoroughly baked. When they
come out, they are shaken in a sieve with
sawdust; when cool, they are weighed, and
made up into parcels, or put into cases or
sacks of "Dudley muslin;" as the coarsest
and strongest of packing-fabrics is ironically
called.

The premises used for this manufacture
need not be large. The machinery occupies
a very small space. A small Pembroke table
fills more width than a single machine; and
the machines may be placed as near together