And now these plates and wheels and screws are to be put together, or "assembled," as this work is called. This is a simple matter just as soon as one has learned where the different parts belong, for they are made by machinery and are sure to fit. After the assembling comes the adjusting of the balance wheel and the hair spring. There is nothing simple about this work, for the tiny screws with the large heads must be put into the rim of the balance wheel with the utmost care, or else all the other work will be useless, and the watch will not be a perfect time keeper; that is, one that neither loses nor gains more than thirty seconds a month.
It is said that the earliest watches made in Europe cost fifteen hundred dollars and took a year to make. There has always been a demand for a cheap pocket timepiece, and of late this demand has been satisfied by the manufacture of the "dollar watch." Properly speaking, this is not a watch at all, but a small spring clock. It has no jewels, and its parts are stamped out of sheets of brass or steel by machinery. The hair springs are made in coils of eight and then broken
apart; and the main springs are made by the mile. Twenty holes are drilled at a time, and the factory in which "dollar watches" were first manufactured is now able to turn out fifteen thousand a day.
IX
THE MAKING OF SHOES
Did you ever stop to think how many different qualities you expect in a shoe? You want the sole to be hard and firm so as to protect your feet in rough walking; and also soft and yielding so as to feel springy and not board-like. You want the upper leather to keep the cold air from coming in; and also porous enough to let the perspiration out. Your feet are not exactly like those of any one else; and yet you expect to find at any shoe store a comfortable shoe ready-made. You expect that shoe to come close to your foot, and yet allow you to move it with perfect freedom. You expect all these good qualities, and what is more remarkable, it does not seem difficult for most people to get them. There is an old saying, "To him who wears shoes, the whole earth is covered with leather"; and although many different materials have been tried in shoemaking, leather is the only one that has proved satisfactory, for the sole of the shoe at least. Of late, however, rubber and rubber combinations and felts and felt combinations have been used.
Most hides of which soles are made come from the large beef packing-houses or from South America. Goatskins come from Africa and India. The greater part of a hide is made up of a sort of gelatine. This easily
spoils, and therefore it has to be "tanned"; that is, soaked in tannin and water. When a man set out to build a tannery, he used to go into the woods where he could be sure of enough oak trees to supply him for many years with the bark from which tannin is made; but it has been found that the bark of several other kinds of trees, such as larch, chestnut, spruce, pine, and hemlock, will tan as well as that of oak. Tannin is now prepared in the forest and brought to the tanners, who put their tanneries where they please, usually near some large city. The hides are first soaked in water, and every particle of flesh is scraped away. They are laid in heaps for a while, then hung in a warm room till the hair loosens and can be easily removed, then soaked in tannic extract and water. The tannin unites with the gelatine; and thus the hide becomes leather. This process requires several months. Hides are also tanned by the use of chemicals, in what is called "chrome" tanning. This process requires only a few hours, but it is expensive.
In earlier times the shoemaker used to go from house to house with his lapstone, waxed end, awl, and other tools. The farmer provided the leather, which he had tanned from the hides of his own cattle. Now, however, manufacturers can buy the soles of one merchant, the heels of another, the box toe and stiffenings of another, and so on. In the United States there are many factories which do nothing but cut soles, or rather stamp them out with dies, a hundred or more in a minute. These soles and also the less