the remainder of your natural life to the business and you could never
do that! That man began to work in glass when he was a boy, and it
has become second nature with him, like speaking his native language.
He has handled the blowing-pipe and the ponty until they are like parts
of his own hands. He almost feels the glass on the end of them."
The Doctor expressed his surprise at the quickness
of the operation, and the simplicity and cheapness of the tools employed.
"All the tools he uses," rejoined the gaffer,
"do not cost more than fifteen dollars, and they will last him his life."
"What is this?" said Lawrence, picking up a piece
of glass from the floor. "It looks like a broken thermometer-tube."
"It was blown for one," said the gaffer.
"Blown?-- so small!" exclaimed Lawrence. "I can't
find any hole in it."
"It has a hole-- or bore, as we call it--
of the usual size; but it is flat. That is to make a very little mercury
look to be a good deal. Do you see a narrow white strip running the
length of the tube?"
Lawrence saw it, and said he had often observed
the stripe in the backs of thermometers, but had never learned what it
was for.
"It is a background to see the mercury against.
Would you like to see such a tube made? Come here. Watch this man."
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