flat irons, semi-circular irons, and irons so
thin and long they must be intended to
iron the inside of ladies' dress gloves quite
to the tips of the fingers. How hot the
rooms were! for it was in the month of
August, and I felt rather relieved when
passing out of these tropical regions to
the temperate zone adjoining, where I found
neatly dressed, taper-fingered, little Glasgow
lasses, stitching pretty pink and blue ribbons
upon thousands of small worked articles,
of the uses of some of which I had not the
least conception, and probably never shall
have.

From these interesting workers I proceeded
to other apartments equally large, wherein
other neat-looking lasses were engaged in the
various " making-up " processes of ribboning,
folding, ironing, ticketing, marking, and
assorting. Thence the finished goods were
conveyed in dozens to the ware-rooms and
sale-rooms—fine, well-lighted floors, in which
the articles were arranged for the inspection
of buyers for the wholesale houses who supply
the shops.

At the time of my visit there were buyers
examining those goods from America,
Germany, the Levant, as well as from the
chief cities of Great Britain. Indeed, our
sewed muslins find their way over most parts
of the civilised world. There is one country,
however, who has hitherto done all in its
power to exclude this branch of our industry
from its shores. France, by prohibitions,
declares that its people shall buy the dear
embroidery of its southern towns instead of
the much cheaper work of Scotland,
forgetting that, if it relaxed these foolish laws,
we should, in return for our worked muslins,
take from them their full value in French
wines, whilst the revenues of France would be
gainers by the duties both ways of the goods
bought and sold.

Before taking leave of the establishment I
have thus been endeavouring to describe,
I may mention that the number of hands—
chiefly female—employed within its walls,
amounts to about five hundred, whilst it
furnishes work—in Scotland and Ireland, but
by far the greater part in the latter—to fully
twenty-five thousand women. The total
value of the embroidery trade within the city
of Glasgow alone, cannot be less than seven
hundred and fifty thousand pounds yearly,
the greater portion of which value is made up
by human labour, and paid for in sixpences
and shillings.

Such is the internal and external working
of one of the enormous establishments happily
called into existence by the fictitious wants
and luxurious tastes of the present age. We
thence see how the demand for a little finery
for our wives, our daughters, and our infants,
brings into active operation a whole army of
workers, male and female; how it employs
steam-ships, waggons, porters, steam-engines,
mechanical ingenuity and artistic skill; and
how, above all, it takes the means of food and
clothing to the humble door of the poor
peasant in the remotest and wildest districts
of Ireland.

THE ROVING ENGLISHMAN.

ON HORSEBACK.

I RECOLLECT having a conversation with a
worthy old Mussulman, who confided to
me, in the course of a long friendship, hi
extreme astonishment that any one should
ever walk anywhere who could ride. A
walk, however, if we do not fall into a brown
study, as studious men are apt to do, is
the best and healthiest exercise possible.
Laughing, therefore, to scorn the doctrine of
the Moslem, still even Captain Barclay might
agree that a carriage or an ambling cob are
both very good things in their place. The
first thing most of us do, who have money
enough, is to buy a horse; the next, to
mismanage it. What those poor animals go
through in the hands of ladies, boys, and other
utterly misguided people, nobody can know
but themselves.

Let us begin with a boy's pony, and see if
we are not able to point out one or two little
things that might be altered. In the first
place, then, we wholly disapprove of the pad,
or soft saddle (without a tree), as a most cruel
invention. It does not sufficiently protect
the backbone, and every sudden jolt or movement
of the rider is likely to injure it. Let
the pad be replaced by the common saddle by
all means. The saddle should not be so small
either as it usually is, and should be well
stuffed, especially towards the shoulder. It
should be remembered, also, that when a
saddle has been used a little while, this stuffing
gets sweated through, and becomes hard and
knotty from unequal pressure. To avoid
this, the stuffing should be taken out
frequently, and though the same material may
be put in again, it should be thoroughly pulled
and dried. I have often seen saddles as hard
inside as they were out, and the horses on
which they were put writhing about like eels,
till they got warm enough to soften their dirty
uncomfortable harness. This often makes
high-couraged horses difficult to mount, and
apt to kick at starting, nor will all the coaxing
in the world cure them if the rider's common
sense does not point out the evil; and it very
seldom does. When a horse is vicious to
mount, nine times in ten he is or has been
badly saddled. Saddles should also be kept
in a dry place, and the lining carefully dried
either by the fire or in the sun, before they
are used again. Nothing is more apt to gall
a horse's back than a damp saddle. An
excellent means of getting rid of the bran-
new look of a saddle, fresh from the maker's, is
to wash it with a weak solution of coffee,
and then two or three washings with common
soft soap will give it a good gloss. Oil should
never be used; it is dirty in the extreme. A