Illustrated Science for Boys and Girls. Unknown

home he might have made an unpleasant exhibition of his unhappiness; but he was a well-bred city boy, of which fact he was somewhat proud, and so his impatience was vented in snapping off the teeth of his pocket-combs, as he sat by the window and looked out into the rain.

      It was the rain which caused his discontent. Only the day before his father, going from New York to Boston on business, had left Paul at his uncle’s, some distance from the “Hub,” to await his return. It being the lad’s first visit, Mr. Sanford had arranged a very full programme for the next day, including a trip in the woods, fishing, a picnic, and in fact quite enough to cover an ordinary week of leisure. Over and over it had been discussed, the hours for each feature apportioned, and through the night Paul had lived the programme over in his half-waking dreams.

      MASTER PAUL DID NOT FEEL HAPPY.

      And now that the eventful morning had come, it brought a drizzling, disagreeable storm, so that Mr. Sanford, as he met his nephew, was constrained to admit that he did not know what they should find to supply the place of the spoiled programme.

      “And my little nephew is so disappointed that he has ruined his pretty comb, into the bargain,” said the uncle.

      “I was—was trying to see what it was made of,” Paul stammered, thrusting the handful of teeth into his coat pocket. “I don’t see how combs are made. Could you make one, uncle?”

      “I never made one,” Mr. Sanford replied, “but I have seen very many made. There is a comb-shop not more than a half-mile away, and it is quite a curiosity to see how they make the great horns, rough and ugly as they are, into all sorts of dainty combs and knicknacks.”

      “What kind of horns, uncle?”

      “Horns from all parts of the country, Paul. This shop alone uses nearly a million horns a year, and they come in car-loads from Canada, from the great West, from Texas, from South America, and from the cattle-yards about Boston and other Eastern cities.”

      “You don’t mean the horns of common cattle?”

      “Yes, Paul; all kinds of horns are used, though some are much tougher and better than others. The cattle raised in the Eastern, Middle and Western States furnish the best horns, and there is the curious difference that the horns of six cows are worth no more than those of a single ox. Many millions of horn combs are made every year in Massachusetts; perhaps more than in all the rest of the country. If you like we will go down after breakfast and have a look at the comb-makers.”

      Paul was pleased with the idea, though he would much rather have passed the day as at first proposed. He was not at all sorry that he had broken up his comb, and even went so far as to cut up the back with his knife, wondering all the while how the smooth, flat, semi-transparent comb had been produced from a rough, round, opaque horn.

      By and by a mail stage came rattling along, without any passengers, and Mr. Sanford took his nephew aboard. They stopped before a low, straggling pile of buildings, located upon both sides of a sluggish looking race-way which supplied the water power, covered passage-ways connecting different portions of the works.

      “Presently, just over this knoll,” said his uncle, “you will see a big pile of horns, as they are unloaded from the cars.”

      MY LADY’S TOILET.

      They moved around the knoll, and there lay a monstrous pile of horns thrown indiscriminately together.

      “Really there are not so many as we should think,” said Mr. Sanford, as Paul expressed his astonishment. “That is only a small portion of the stock of this shop. I will show you a good many more.”

      He led the way to a group of semi-detached buildings in rear of the principal works, and there Paul saw great bins of horns, the different sizes and varieties carefully assorted, the total number so vast that the immense pile in the open yard began to look small in contrast.

      At one of the bins a boy was loading a wheelbarrow, and when he pushed his load along a plank track through one of the passage-ways Mr. Sanford and his nephew followed. As the passage opened into another building, the barrow was reversed and its load deposited in a receptacle a few feet lower.

      In this room only a single man was employed, and the peculiar character of his work at once attracted the attention of Paul. In a small frame before him was suspended a very savage-looking circular saw, running at a high rate of speed. The operator caught one of the great horns by its tip, gave it a turn through the air before his eyes, seized it in both hands and applied it to the saw. With a sharp hiss the keen teeth severed the solid tip from the body of the horn, and another movement trimmed away the thin, imperfect parts about the base. The latter fell into a pile of refuse at the foot of the frame, the tip was cast into a box with others; the horn, if large, was divided into two or more sections, a longitudinal slit sawn in one side, and the sections thrown into a box.

      THE NEW CIRCLE COMB

      “This man,” said Mr. Sanford, “receives large pay and many privileges, on account of the danger and unpleasant nature of his task. He has worked at this saw for about forty years, and in that time has handled, according to his record, some twenty-five millions of horns, or over two thousand for every working day. He has scarcely a whole finger or thumb upon either hand—many of them are entirely gone; but most of these were lost during his apprenticeship. The least carelessness was rewarded by the loss of a finger, for the saw cannot be protected with guards, as in lumber-cutting.”

      Paul watched the skilful man with the closest interest, shuddering to see how near his hands passed and repassed to the merciless saw-teeth as he sent a ceaseless shower of parts of horns rattling into their respective boxes. Before he left the spot Paul took a pencil and made an estimate.

      “Why, uncle,” he said, “to cut so many as that, he must saw over three horns every minute for ten hours a day. I wouldn’t think he could handle them so fast.”

      Then, as he saw how rapidly one horn after another was finished, he drew forth his little watch and found that the rugged old sawyer finished a horn every ten seconds with perfect ease.

      “Would you like to learn this trade?” the old fellow asked. He held up his hands with the stumps of fingers and thumbs outspread; but Paul only laughed and followed his uncle.

      They watched a boy wheeling a barrow-load of the horns as they came from the saw, and beheld them placed in enormous revolving cylinders, through which a stream of water was running, where they remained until pretty thoroughly washed. Being removed from these, they were plunged into boilers ranged along one side of the building, filled with hot water.