suppose, for so many curious works; what sort of knowledge is most necessary?

.

Fa. There is not any which may not be occasionally employed; but the two sciences which most assist the manufacturer are mechanics and chemistry. The one for building mills, working of mines, and in general for constructing wheels, wedges, pulleys, &c., either to shorten the labour of man, by performing it in less time, or to perform what the strength of man alone could not accomplish:-the other in fusing and working ores, in dyeing and bleaching, and extracting the virtues of various substances for particular uses; making of soap, for instance, is a chemical operation; and, by chemistry, an ingenious gentleman, some time ago, found out a way of bleaching a piece of cloth in eight-and-forty hours, which by the common process would have taken up a great many weeks.--You have heard of Sir Richard Arkwright, who died some years since ?

Hen. Yes, I have heard he was at first only a barber, and shaved people for a penny apiece.

Fa. He did so; but having a strong turn for mechanics, he invented, or at least perfected, a machine, by which one pair of hands might do the work of twenty or thirty; and, as in this country every one is free to rise by merit, he acquired the largest fortune in the county, had a great many hundreds of workmen under his orders, and had leave given him by the king to put Sir before his name.

Hen. Did that do him any good?

Fa. It pleased him, I suppose, or he would not have accepted of it; and you will allow, I imagine, that if titles are used, it does honour to those who bestow them, when they are given to such as have made themselves noticed for something useful.--Arkwright used to say, that if he had time to perfect his inventions, he would put a fleece of wool into a box, and it should come out broad-cloth.

Hen. What did he mean by that? was there any fairy in the box to turn it into broad-cloth with her wand?

Fa. He was assisted by the only fairies that ever had the power of transformation,-Art, and Industry; he meant that he would contrive so many machines, wheel within wheel, that the combing, carding, and other various operations, should be performed by mechanism, almost without the hand of man.

Hen. I think, if I had not been told, I should never have been able to guess that my coat came off the back of the sheep.

Fa. You hardly would; but there are manufactures in which the material is much more changed than in woollen cloth. What can be meaner in appearance than sand and ashes? Would you imagine anything beautiful could be made out of such a mixture? Yet the furnace transforms this into that transparent crystal we call glass, than which nothing is more sparkling, more brilliant, more full of lustre. It throws about the rays of light as though it had life and motion.

Hen. There is a glass-shop in London, which always puts me in mind of Aladdin's palace.

Fa. It is certain, that if a person, ignorant of the manufacture, were to see one of our capital shops, he would think all the treasures of Golconda were centred there, and that every drop of cut glass was worth a prince's ransom. Again, who would suppose, on seeing the green stalks of a plant, that it could be formed into a texture so smooth, so snowy white, so firm, and yet so flexible, as to wrap around the limbs and adapt itself to every movement of the body? Who would guess this fibrous stalk could be made to float in such light, undulating folds as in our lawns and cambrics; not less fine, we presume, than that transparent drapery which the Romans called ventus textilis,-woven wind. Hen. I wonder how anybody can spin such fine thread.

Fa. Their fingers must have the touch of a spider, that, as Pope says,

"Feels at each thread, and lives along the line;"

and, indeed, you recollect that Arachne was a spinster. Lace is a still finer production from flax, and is one of those in which the original material is most improved. How many times the price of a pound of flax do you think that flax will be worth, when made into lace? Hen. A great many times, I suppose.

Fa. Flax, at the first hand, is bought at fourteenpence a pound. They make lace at Valenciennes, in French Flanders, of ten guineas a yard; I believe, indeed, higher, but we will say ten guineas: this yard of lace will weigh probably not more than half an ounce. What is the value of half an ounce of flax?

Hen. It comes to one farthing and three quarters of a farthing.

Fa. Right; now tell me how many times the original value the lace is worth.

Hen. Prodigious! it is worth 5,760 times as much as the flax it is made of.

Fa. Yet there is another material that is still more improvable than flax.

Hen. What can that be?

Fa. Iron. Suppose the price of pig-iron to be ten shillings a hundredweight; this is not quite one farthing for two ounces; now you have seen some of the beautiful cut steel, that looks like diamonds ?

Hen. Yes; I have seen buckles, and pins, and watch-chains.

Fa. Then you can form an idea of it; but you have seen only the most common sorts. There was a chain made at Woodstock, in Oxfordshire, and sent to France, which weighed only two ounces, and cost 1707. Calculate how many times that had increased its value.

Hen. Amazing! It was worth 163,600 times the value of the iron it was made of.

:

Fa. That is what manufacturers can do; here man is a kind of a creator, and, like the great Creator, he may please himself with his work, and say, it is good. In the last-mentioned manufacture, too, that of steel, the English have the honour of excelling all the world. Hen. What are the chief manufactures of England? Fa. We have, at present, a greater variety than I can pretend to enumerate; but our staple manufacture is woollen cloth. England abounds in fine pastures and extensive downs, which feed great numbers of sheep hence our wool has always been a valuable article of trade; but we did not always know how to work it. We used to sell it to the Flemish or Lombards, who wrought it into cloth; till, in the year 1326, Edward the Third invited some Flemish weavers over, to teach us the art. But there was not much cloth made in England till the reign of Henry the Seventh. Manchester and Birmingham are towns which have arisen to great consequence from small beginnings, almost within the memory of old men now living; the first for cotton and muslin goods, the second for cutlery and hardware, in which we at this moment excel all Europe. Of late years, too, carpets, beautiful as fine tapestry, have been fabricated in this country. Our clocks and watches are greatly esteemed. The earthenware plates and dishes, which we all use in common, and the elegant set for the tea-table, ornamented with musical instruments, which we admired in our visit yesterday, belong to a very extensive manufactory, the seat of which is at Burslem, in Staffordshire. The principal potteries there belong to one person, an excellent chemist, and a man of great taste; he, in conjunction with another man of taste, who is since dead, has made our clay more valuable than the finest porcelain of China. He has moulded it into all the forms of grace and beauty that are to be met with in the precious remains of the Greek and Etruscan artists. In the more common articles, he has pencilled it with the most elegant designs, shaped it into shells and

leaves, twisted it into wicker-work, and trailed the ductile foliage around the light basket. He has filled our cabinets and chimney-pieces with urns, lamps, and vases, on which are lightly traced, with the purest simplicity, the fine forms and floating draperies of Herculaneum. In short, he has given to our houses a classic air, and has made every saloon and every diningroom schools of taste. I should add, that there is a great demand abroad for this elegant manufacture. The Empress Catherine of Russia had some magnificent services of it; and subsequently a service was sent to the King of Spain, intended as a present from him to the Archbishop of Toledo, which cost a thousand pounds. Some morning you shall go through the rooms in the London warehouses.

Hen. I should like very much to see manufactures, now you have told me such curious things about them.

Fa. You will do well. There is much more entertainment to a cultivated mind in seeing a pin made, than in many a fashionable diversion which young people half ruin themselves to attend. In the mean time I will give you some account of one of the most elegant of them, which is paper.

Hen. Pray do, my dear father.

Fa. It shall be left for another evening, however, for it is now late. Good night.

TWELFTH EVENING.

A LESSON IN THE ART OF DISTINGUISHING.

F. COME hither, Charles. What is it that you see grazing in the meadow before you?

C. It is a horse.

F. Whose horse is it?

C. I do not know; I never saw it before.

F. How do you know it is a horse, if you never saw it before?