this lot of homœpathic medicine vials." The "vials" were a small
stack of hollow glass canes, about five feet in length, standing in a
corner of the work-room, into which the visitors had followed the boy.
"Though, of course," added the gaffer, "to make them, we don't flatten
the bore, but only blow it larger."
"Then how are vials made out of these tubes?"
"They are cut into pieces of the right length,
then the bottoms are melted and closed in by means of a common
blow-pipe, such as chemists use."
Lawrence was about to ask a similar question
with regard to the thermometers, when a man came along and, stooping,
commenced cutting the long tube into uniform lengths of about five feet,
and packing them together into a narrow, long box.
"These," said the gaffer, "he sends to his shop
in Boston,-- for he is a thermometer-maker; there they are cut up into
tubes of the right length; an end of each one is melted and blown out into
a bulb,-- the tube itself serving as a very small blowing-pipe. To avoid
getting moisture into the bulb, air from a small india-rubber bag is used,
instead of breath from the mouth. As the bag is squeezed at one end, the
bulb swells at the other."
"Then how is the mercury put in? So small a
bore!" said Lawrence, trying to find it with a pin point.
"The glass is heated and that expands the air
in it, and expels the greater part of it. As the air that
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