The workman takes a long iron wire, with its end oiled, and pushes it through the soft clay in the direction of the stem, to form the bore, and he directs the wire by feeling with his left hand the progress of its point. He lays the pipe in the groove of one of the jaws of the mould, with the wire sticking in it; applies the other jaw, brings them smartly together, and unites them by a clamp or vice, which produces the external form. A lever is now brought down, which presses an oiled stopper into the bowl of the pipe, while it is in the mould, forcing it sufficiently down to form the cavity; the wire being meanwhile thrust backwards and forwards so as to pierce the tube completely through. The wire must become visible at the bottom of the bowl, otherwise the pipe will be imperfect. The wire is now withdrawn, the jaws of the mould opened, the pipe taken out, and the redundant clay removed with a knife. After drying for a day or two, the pipes are scraped, polished with a piece of hard wood, and the stems being bent into the desired form, they are carried to the baking kiln, which is capable of firing fifty gross in from 8 to 12 hours. A workman and a child can easily make five gross of pipes in a day.
No tobacco-pipes are so highly prized as those made in Natolia, in Turkey, out of meerschaum, a somewhat plastic magnesian stone, of a soft greasy feel, which is formed into pipes after having been softened with water. It becomes white and hard in the kiln.
A tobacco-pipe kiln should diffuse an equal heat to every part of its interior, while it excludes the smoke of the fire. The crucible, or large sagger, A, A, [figs. 1155.] and [1156.], is a cylinder, covered in with a dome. It is placed over the fireplace B, and enclosed within a furnace of ordinary brickwork D, D, lined with fire-bricks E, E. Between this lining and the cylinder, a space of about 4 inches all round is left for the circulation of the flame. There are 12 supports or ribs between the cylinder and the furnace lining, which form so many flues, indicated by the dotted lines x, in [fig. 1156.] (the dotted circle representing the cylinder). These ribs are perforated with occasional apertures, as shown in [fig. 1155.], for the purpose of connecting the adjoining flues; but the main bearing of the hollow cylinder is given by five piers, b, b, c, formed of bricks projecting over and beyond each other. One of these piers c, is placed at the back of the fireplace, and the other four at the sides b, b. These project nearly into the centre, in order to support and strengthen the bottom; while the flues pass up between them, unite at the top of the cylinder in the dome L, and discharge the smoke by the chimney N.
The lining F, E, E, of the chimney is open on one side to form the door, by which the cylinder is charged and discharged. The opening is permanently closed as high as k, [fig. 1155.], by an iron plate plastered over with fire-clay; above this it is left open, and shut merely with temporary brickwork while the furnace is going. When this is removed, the furnace can be filled or emptied through the opening, the cylindric crucible having a correspondent aperture in its side, which is closed in the following ingenious way, while the furnace is in action. The workman first spreads a layer of clay round the edge of the opening, he then sticks the stems of broken pipes across from one side to the other, and plasters up the interstices with clay, exactly like the lath-and-plaster work of a ceiling. The whole of the cylinder, indeed, is constructed in this manner, the bottom being composed of a great many fragments of pipe stems, radiating to the centre; these are coated at the circumference with a layer of clay. A number of bowls of broken pipes are inserted in the clay; in these other fragments are placed upright to form the sides of the cylinder. The ribs round the outside, which form the flues, are made in the same way, as well as the dome L; by which means the cylindric case may be made very strong, and yet so thin as to require little clay in the building, a moderate fire to heat it, while it is not apt to split asunder. The pipes are arranged within, as shown in the [figure], with their bowls resting against the circumference and their ends supported on circular pieces of clay r, which are set up in the centre for that purpose. Six small ribs are made to project inwards all round the crucible, at the proper heights, to support the different ranges of pipes, without having so many resting on each other as to endanger their being crushed by the weight. By this mode of distribution, the furnace may contain 50 gross, or 7200 pipes, all baked within 8 or 9 hours; the fire being gradually raised, or damped if occasion be, by a plate partially slid over the chimney top.
TODDY, Sura, Mee-ra, sweet juice.—The proprietors of coco-nut plantations in the peninsula of India, and in the Island of Ceylon, instead of collecting a crop of nuts, frequently reap the produce of the trees by extracting sweet juice from the flower-stalk. When the flowering branch is half shot, the toddy-drawers bind the stock round with a young coco-nut leaf in several places, and beat the spadix with a short baton of ebony. This beating is repeated daily for ten or twelve days, and about the end of that period a portion of the flower-stalk is cut off. The stump then begins to bleed, and an earthen vessel (chatty) or a calabash is suspended under it, to receive the juice, which is by the Europeans called toddy.
A thin slice is taken from the stump daily, and the toddy is removed twice a day. A coco-nut frequently pushes out a new spadix once a month; and after each spadix begins to bleed, it continues to produce freely for a month, by which time another is ready to supply its place. The old spadix continues to give a little juice for another month, after which it withers; so that there are sometimes two pots attached to a tree at one time, but never more. Each of these spadices, if allowed to grow, would produce a bunch of nuts from two to twenty. Trees in a good soil produce twelve bunches in the year; but when less favourably situated, they often do not give more than six bunches. The quantity of six English pints of toddy is sometimes yielded by a tree daily.