for bringing to perfection a manufacture, which, in the aggregate, produces employment for a large number of workmen, at a comparatively small cost of crude material.

To conclude: the invention of Glass-making has not been more beautifully illustrated than in the following reflections, of philosophical eloquence, from the pen of Dr. Johnson:—

"It might contribute to dispose us to a kinder regard for the labours of one another, if we were to consider from what umpromising beginnings the most useful productions of art have probably arisen. Who, when he first saw the sand or ashes, by casual intenseness of heat, melted into a metalline form, rugged with excrescences and clouded with impurities, would have imaged that, in this shapeless lump, lay concealed so many conveniences of life as would, in time, constitute a great part of the happiness of the world? Yet, by some such fortuitous liquefaction was mankind taught to procure a body, at once, in a high degree, solid and transparent; which might admit the light of the sun, and exclude the violence of the wind; which might extend the sight of the philosopher to new ranges of existence, and charm him, at one time, with the unbounded extent of material creation, and at another, with the endless subordination of animal life; and, what is of yet more importance, might supply the decays of nature, and succour old age with subsidiary sight. Thus was the first artificer in Glass employed, though without his knowledge or expectation. He was facilitating and prolonging the enjoyment of light, enlarging the avenues of science, and conferring the highest and most lasting pleasures; he was enabling the student to contemplate nature, and the beauty to behold herself."