remembered that he must make a call before
he entered his chambers.

This call led us out of a great thoroughfare,
through two or three narrow and dark streets,
to the door of a dingy house. As we paused
on the threshold, my companion asked me if
I had ever seen a tobacco-pipe manufactory.
I expressed my inexperience; and, having
been cautioned against sermons on what I was
about to see, followed my eccentric friend
down a dark passage, which terminated in a
very dirty and a very dark warehouse. A
few samples of tobacco-pipes lay upon a
counter, and one side of the warehouse was
skirted with drawers full of "yards of clay"
—my eccentric friend's ordinary expression
when alluding to his pipes. In a dark corner,
a strong man was savagely punching huge
blocks of clay with a heavy wooden bar; in
another corner lay a huge pile of clay-blocks
in the rough state—apparently a heap of dirt,
of little use to anybody. A mild woman—the
wife of the manufacturer—showed us about
with a cheerful manner. My friend, who took
an evident interest in all the processes we
witnessed, still contrived to maintain his
eccentric habit, by continually expressing his
unconcern. As we looked at the skilful action
of the workmen's fingers, my friend allowed
that they played the fiddle well, but added
that they could only play the fiddle.
However, I left him to pursue his eccentric way,
and wandered about with unfeigned curiosity.

Turning from the muscular fellow who was
beating the rough clay with the wooden bar,
and moistening it, that it might yield to the
pressure of the mould, I suddenly saw a black
gaping mouth before me, that seemed to be
in the agony of swallowing a dense stack of
tobacco-pipes; this, I learned, was the pipe-
kiln. The pipes were arranged in exact rows,
and in vast quantities. I ventured to express
my astonishment at the number of pipes in
the capacious kiln; whereupon the clay-beater
paused from his labour, and, with a smile that
expressed pity for my ignorance, declared that
there was a mere handful on the premises.

"There are a few still, up there," he added,
pointing to the roof of the warehouse.

I followed the direction of his finger, and
saw above me a roof of tobacco-pipes piled
in regular rows on brackets. The number
appeared incalculable, but the clay-beater
contemptuously pronounced it insignificant.
He informed me that I might see "a few
more," if I would have the goodness to go up
stairs. My eccentric friend vowed that the
trouble was excessive—that our business was
with the pipes when they had tobacco in
them, and not with the people who made
them; and, as he remarked (having had a
sharp pecuniary altercation with the
manufacturer's wife), who took particular care to
charge a remunerative price for them. But
he mounted the stairs, in spite of his objections,
and followed me into the room where
the battered clay of the beater below was
undergoing other processes. Here and there
men seemed to be printing off pipes—the
action of their arms, and the movement of
their presses nearly resembling those of hand-
printing. A pale woman sat in the centre of
the room with a counter before her, and two
or three delicate tools; but we went past her
at once to the man who had a mound of soft
grey clay before him. He was working
briskly. He first seized two lumps of clay,
each of the average size of an apple, and
having carelessly kneaded them with his
fingers, seemed to throw them contemptuously
upon the board before them. Then, with the
palms of his hand he rolled them sharply out
on the board, leaving one end of each lump
very thick, and producing, altogether, two clay
tadpoles of a large size. These he took up,
and placed with others in a row, all pressed
and sticking together. The apparent unconcern
and indifference with which the entire
operation was performed struck us
particularly. When we had sufficiently noticed
the manufacture of gigantic tadpoles, we
crossed the room to an opposite bench where
a man was working rapidly. Here we found
a confused heap of clay tadpoles, ready to
be run through and burnt into seemly
pipes.

We watched the operations of the second
skilled labourer with intense interest. First,
with a weary air he took up a bundle of
limp clay tadpoles, and threw them down close
beside him. He then took a fine steel rod in
his left hand, and seizing a tadpole, drew its
long slender tail on to the rod. This operation
was so dexterously performed, that the rod
never protruded the least to the right or to
the left, but was kept, by the fine touch of the
right-hand fingers, exactly in the centre of the
tube. The spitted tadpole was then laid flat
in the lower half of the metal pipe mould;
the upper part was pulled down over it, and
then pressed. On lifting the mould from the
press, the workman quickly cut away the
superfluous clay that stood up beyond the
bowl, opened the mould, and disclosed, to the
undisguised admiration even of my eccentric
friend, the graceful flow of his usual "yard
of clay." But it was not yet ready for
smoking; very far from it.

It was still a damp, leaden grey pipe, with
two broad seams of clay projecting from it,
throughout its entire length. It was ragged
too. On these deficiencies my friend began
to offer a few pungent remarks; when the
workman interrupted him by pointing towards
an industrious woman, who seemed to be in a
desperate hurry; yet she was not at all
excited. My friend suggested that steam must
be circulating in her nimble fingers, instead
of blood. She smiled at the pleasantry; and
said meekly enough, that it was custom. She
was as clumsy as I should be when she began:
—but long, long days of experience,—there,
sitting before that board, and cutting
incessantly those seams that curl so neatly off the