The wool, when properly dried, is transferred to a machine called the plucker, which is always superintended by a boy of 12 or 14 years of age, being very light work. He lays the tresses of wool pretty evenly upon the feed-apron, or table covered with an endless moving web of canvas, which, as it advances, delivers the ends of the long tufts to a pair of fluted rollers, whence it is introduced into a fanning apparatus, somewhat similar to the [willow] employed in the [cotton manufacture], which see. The filaments are turned out, at the opposite end of this winnowing machine, straightened, cleaned, and ready for the combing operation. According to the old practice of the trade, and still for the finer descriptions of the long staple, according to the present practice, the wool is carded by hand. This is far more severe labour than any subservient to machinery, and is carried on in rooms rendered close and hot by the number of stoves requisite to heat the combs, and so enable them to render the fibres soft, flexible, and elastic. This is a task at which only robust men are engaged. They use three implements: 1. a pair of combs for each person; 2. a post, to which one of the combs can be fixed; 3. a comb-pot, or small stove for heating the teeth of the combs. Each comb is composed either of two or three rows of pointed tapering steel teeth, b, [fig. 1203.], disposed in two or three parallel planes, each row being a little longer than the preceding. They are made fast at the roots to a wooden stock or head c, which is covered with horn, and has a handle d, fixed into it at right angles to the lines of the teeth. The spaces between these two or three planes of teeth, is about one-third of an inch at their bottoms, but somewhat more at their tips. The first combing, when the fibres are most entangled, is performed with the two-row toothed combs; the second or finishing combing, with the three-row toothed.
In the workshop a post is planted ([fig. 1204.]) upright, for resting the combs occasionally upon, during the operation. An iron stem g, projects from it horizontally, having its end turned up, so as to pass through a hole in the handle of the comb. Near its point of insertion into the post, there is another staple point h, which enters into the hollow end of the handle; which, between these two catches, is firmly secured to the post. The stove is a very simple affair, consisting merely of a flat iron plate, heated by fire or steam, and surmounted with a similar plate, at an interval sufficient to allow the teeth to be inserted between them at one side, which is left open, while the space between their edges, on the other sides, is closed to confine the heat.
In combing the wool, the workman takes it up in tresses of about four ounces each, sprinkles it with oil, and rolls it about in his hands, to render all the filaments equally unctuous. Some harsh dry wools require one-sixteenth their weight of oil, others no more than a fortieth. He next attaches a heated comb to the post, with its teeth pointed upwards, seizes one-half of the tress of wool in his hands, throws it over the teeth, then draws it through them, and thus repeatedly: leaving a few straight filaments each time upon the comb. When the comb has in this way collected all the wool, it is placed with its points inserted into the cell of the stove, with the wool hanging down outside, exposed to the influence of the heat. The other comb, just removed in a heated state from the stove, is planted upon the post, and furnished in its turn with the remaining two-ounce tress of wool; after which it supplants the preceding at the stove. Having both combs now hot, he holds one of them with his left hand over his knee, being seated upon a low stool, and seizing the other with his right hand, he combs the wool upon the first, by introducing the teeth of one comb into the wool stuck in the other, and drawing them through it. This manipulation is skilfully repeated, till the fibres are laid truly parallel, like a flat tress of hair. It is proper to begin by combing the tips of the tress, and to advance progressively, from the one end towards the other, till at length the combs are worked with their teeth as closely together as is possible, without bringing them into collision. If the workman proceeded otherwise, he would be apt to rupture the filaments, or tear their ends entirely out of one of the combs. The flocks left at the end of the process, because they are too short for the comber to grasp them in his hand, are called noyls. They are unfit for the worsted spinner, and are reserved for the coarse cloth manufacture.
The wool finally drawn off from the comb, though it may form a uniform tress of straight filaments, must yet be combed again at a somewhat lower temperature, to prepare it perfectly for the spinning operation. From ten to twelve slivers are then arranged in one parcel.
To relieve the workman from this laborious and not very salubrious task, has been the object of many mechanical inventions. One of these, considerably employed in this country and in France, is the invention of the late Mr. John Collier, of Paris, for which a patent was obtained in England, under the name of John Platt, of Salford, in November, 1827. It consists of two comb-wheels, about ten feet in diameter, having hollow iron spokes filled with steam, in order to keep the whole apparatus at a proper combing heat. The comb forms a circle, made fast to the periphery of the wheel, the teeth being at right angles to the plane of the wheel. The shafts of the two wheels are mounted in a strong frame of cast iron; not, however, in horizontal positions, but inclined at acute angles to the horizon, and in planes crossing each other, so that the teeth of one circular comb sweep with a steady obliquity over the teeth of the other, in a most ingenious manner, with the effect of combing the tresses of wool hung upon them. The proper quantity of long wool, in its ordinary state, is stuck in handfuls upon the wheel, revolving slowly, by a boy, seated upon the ground at one side of the machine. Whenever the wheel is dressed, the machine is made to revolve more rapidly, by shifting its driving-band on another pulley; and it is beautiful to observe the delicacy and precision with which it smoothes the tangled tress. When the wools are set in rapid rotation, the loose ends of the fleece, by the centrifugal force, are thrown out, in the direction of radii, upon the teeth of the other revolving comb-wheel, so as to be drawn out and made truly straight. The operation commences upon the tips of the tresses, where the wheels, by the oblique posture of their shafts, are at the greatest distance apart; but as the planes slowly approach to parallelism, the teeth enter more deeply into the wool, till they progressively comb the whole length of its fibres. The machines being then thrown out of geer, the teeth are stript of the tresses by the hand of the attendant; the noyls, or short refuse wool, being also removed, and kept by itself.
This operation being one of simple superintendence, not of handicraft effort and skill, like the old combing of long wool, is now performed by boys or girls of 13 and 14 years of age; and places in a striking point of view the influence of automatic mechanism, in so embodying dexterity and intelligence in a machine, as to render the cheap and tractable labour of children a substitute for the high-priced and often refractory exertions of workmen too prone to capricious combinations. The chief precaution to be taken with this machine, is to keep the steam-joints tight, so as not to wet the apartments, and to provide due ventilation for the operatives.