At this date about 260 complete sea lights and about 300 complete harbour lights have been sent out, together with about 200 smaller port lights and about 370 of the recently designed ship lights.
Very striking specimens of optical science have been contributed by Messrs. Chance, as exemplified in the list of dioptric lights they have supplied around our own coasts, of which The Longships, the Wolf Rock, the Flamborough Head, the Hartland Point, the Start Point, the South Stack Rock, The Casquets, Bull Point, Anvil Point, the Eddystone, and many others are examples.
Mr. Kenward will be glad to give further information to any member of the Association who may take an interest in the subject.
Locks and Lock Making.—[J. C. Tildesley.]—(B. 77.) The price of cheap padlocks is still lower. Iron padlocks of the cheapest class are now being made in this district (Willenhall) and delivered free in Bombay and Calcutta, at fivepence halfpenny per dozen!
In reference to the table (B. 89), the number of employers may be set down as 100 less (that is 350) and at least 1,000 must be deducted from the total number of workpeople, bringing it to about 3,950.
The production of locks in the district may now be computed at 25,000 dozens per week, as against 31,500 dozens per week, as estimated in 1865. The reductions being chiefly in the pad, cabinet, chest, and till departments, which are being driven hard by America and continental competition. On the other hand, door locks (rim, dead, mortice, and drawback) are being made in larger quantities than ever, and are being sold at prices which would have been regarded as fabulous twenty years ago.
The average earnings of locksmiths are 15 to 20 per cent. less than the figures given at (B. 89.) American competition in castings has, so far as the lock trade is concerned, considerably diminished since 1865. By grinding English sand to the fineness of flour, and by the adoption of Plaster of Paris moulds and improved methods of casting, transatlantic supremacy over England no longer prevails. While in the matter of cheap and clear castings they have maintained for their productions the reputation for practical qualities which has so long distinguished them. Artistic design and ornamentation have improved. Germany is now the most formidable rival to the English lockmaker, owing to the low wages and long hours endured by the German locksmiths. The remedy for this state of affairs ought, in the interests both of commerce and humanity to be found not in a retrograde movement on the part of England to Germany, but in the uprising of the German workman, to secure the same status as that enjoyed by his English confrere.
Magic Lantern Slide Painting.—[H. H. Stanton.]—The old fashioned method of tracing from a drawing or engraving though still used, has given way to a great extent to the introduction of photography. Special drawings are made, photographed on to glass, and subsequently painted. Girls and also artists are employed in the work. Photographic slides from various parts of the world come to Birmingham to be finished.
Measuring Rules and Tapes.—[John Rabone.] (B. 628.) It is noteworthy that in the “garret” at Heathfield Hall, near Birmingham, where Watt amused himself during the latter years of his life with his copying machines—the prototypes of those afterwards known as the American and Enfield—is still to be seen an example of Watt’s early work in London before he entered upon his remodelling of the steam engine in connection with Matthew Boulton.