dening ladies; as, with them, the most delicate hand and arm may cut off branches from prickly or thorny plants, or from trees and shrubs, of any kind, half an inch in diameter. By using both hands, the most, delicate person may cut through a branch of an inch in diameter. The great advantage of these instruments is, that they amputate by a draw-cut like a knife, instead of by a crushing cut like common scissors, or hedgeshears. This is effected by the spring lever, b, and the oblong opening, c, by which a compound motion is produced in the cutting blade, d. Neither these instruments, nor the very excellent grape and flower gatherer manufactured by the same party, are of recent invention; but they have been improved on by Messrs. Steers and Wilkinson in various ways, and are so admirably adapted for lady gardeners, that, considering the views we have as to the suitableness of certain parts of gardening for females, we cannot sufficiently recommend them."

In the Repertory of Arts for 1817, there are cuts of five or six varieties of garden-shears on the principle of Wilkinson's, comprising a groove in which the rivet works, or rather which allows one of the blades, by means of a lever attached to the opposite shank, to unite with the motion of the scissors or shears a drawing motion similar to that given to a pruning knife. These pruning instruments are ascribed to Mr. James Ogden, at T. D. Astley's, Esq., Duckenfield, Lancashire, who received for his improvement ten guineas from the Society for the Encouragement of Arts, &c.

Snuffers.

Constructed on a similar principle with scissors, though entirely distinct in their manufacture and use, may be here mentioned that well known domestic implement the snuffers, an article which our prevalent habit of lighting lamps or candles, to prolong as it were the day for the purposes of industry or pleasure, and the general

cleanliness of all classes of society, has rendered universally necessary. The ordinary snuffers not being convenient for the removal of the obstructions generated on wicks when oil is burnt, Mr. Champion of Sheffield devised what he calls the "pelican lamp scissors," the blade of which is supposed to bear some resemblance to the bill of the bird above named, and which, being made thin and sharp, and working in a shallow box, appears much better adapted to snuff the wicks of argand burners than either the common snuffers or scissors, which are generally used as more manageable. The introduction of gas in inost large towns, by having superseded, to a great extent, the consumption of oil as well as candles, has, at the same time, proportionately affected the demand for snuffers.

Snuffers, as already intimated, are in reality a kind of scissors, constructed not only to cut off the excrescence which accumulates on the wick during combustion, but at the same time to convey the snuff itself into a box or cavity. Very few ancient snuffers have come down to us so far as can be judged from the appearance of such as have been casually preserved or represented, they must have performed the operation very indifferently, elegant and expensive as they may have been, much worse, indeed, than it is now every night performed in the poorest cottages in the kingdom by instruments of the value of a few pence. Those who may be curious to see a representation of a pair of ancient snuffers, will find a cut of such in Hutchin's History of Dorsetshire. They were found in digging the foundation of a granary at the foot of a hill adjoining to Cotton mansion-house (formerly the seat of the respectable family of the Mohuns). They were of brass, and weighed six ounces. "The great difference," says Mr. Hutchins, "between these and modern utensils of the same name and use, is, that these are in shape like a heart, fluted, and, consequently, terminate in a point. They consist of two equal lateral cavities, by the edges of which the snuff is cut off and received into the ca

vities, from which it is not got out without particular application and trouble. There are two circumstances attending this little utensil which seem to bespeak it of considerable age: the roughness of the workmanship, which is in all respects as rude and coarse as can be well imagined, and the peculiarity of the form." Hone, in his Every-day Book, gives a figure of an antique pair of snuffers, exactly agreeing with the foregoing description.

Snuffers for common purposes are, at present, made in very great quantities, not only of brass and of wrought iron, but, as mentioned in a former volume, thousands of grosses are cast immediately from pig-metal, and being subsequently annealed, they are filed, brushed with emery, or burnished, so as to look very well; and as the cutting edge does not soon wear away, they are not ill adapted for use. The best polished snuffers are made of cast steel, which has been decarbonated in order that it may work freely upon the anvil, and at the same time retain that peculiar compactness of grain which cast steel so beautifully exhibits. Articles of this description are finished to a certain point; that is, perfected as to form and fitting, and then case-hardened, after which they are susceptible of that fine black lustre or polish peculiar to cast steel. Trays of a similar material, and got up in the same style, are sometimes manufactured: these, when etched with landscapes and other subjects, have an exceedingly rich and elegant appearance.

To describe the great variety of snuffers which fashion and ingenuity have devised, would be tedious and difficult, even with the aid of numerous cuts. As an improvement upon the simple principle of cutting off the top of the wick, and conveying it into the receptacle, out of which, however, the contents are constantly liable to fall,-sundry devices have been conceived and executed to close the box during the opening and the operation of the cutter. This desideratum is effected, in some sorts of snuffers, by means of one tube revolving inside another; and again, as in the

case of Hobday's patent, by the rising and falling of a steel slide or cutter, which at once hides and retains the snuff in the box. This latter is an elegant and ingenious device; the only objection to snuffers on this construction being, that every operation is accompanied by a disagreeable snap of the machinery, somewhat like that occasioned by the closing of a common rat-trap. Snuffers of all sorts have a coiled steel spring in a cell of the shanks, where the rivet is placed, in order to keep the box closed by the cutter when not actually in

use.

CHAP. III.

INTERCHANGEABLE USE OF INSTRUMENTS OF AGRICULTURE AND WAR. SCYTHES AND SICKLES.-FLEMISH REFUGEE WORKMEN. SEATS OF MANUFACTURE. -COMMON METHOD OF MAKING PATENT, OR ROLLED, BLADES. — HAY AND STRAW SICKLE-MAKING. REAPING HOOKS. HAINAULT

SCYTHES.

KNIVES.

SCYTHE.

REAPING MACHINES.

THERE can be no doubt that, in all places where the knowledge of metals and the art of working them existed, the fabrication of implements for the use of the cultivator of the soil would accompany the manufacture of arms, even if that might not anciently be common, which we have occasionally heard of in modern times, the adoption of the scythe for the sword, or, vice versa, according to the exigencies of the case. The Jews, in particular, appear not to have been unaccustomed to beat their swords into ploughshares and their spears into pruning-hooks; neither to the practice of restoring the material to its more pacific purposes when their wars were over. Hence the Scripture exhortation to that people, "Beat your ploughshares

into swords, and your pruning-hooks into spears."Joel, iii. 10. And the prediction of the prophet, that "They shall beat their swords into ploughshares, and their spears into pruning-hooks," Isaiah, ii. 4.; reaping instruments are probably meant, rather than pruning knives merely. Virgil alludes to similar transformations of the implements of husbandry into weapons of warfare:

"Et curvæ rigidum falces conflantur in ensem." Georg. i. 508.

Translated, by Dryden,

"The crooked scythes are straighten'd into swords."

Or, according to Stawell,