Anyone standing in a field which is in full bloom and waiting to be picked over, would think that the men have a hopeless task to face, if they purpose gathering all their flowers. But they move down the beds swiftly, snapping the stems, and throwing the flowers into big baskets, which are carried off to the homestead as they fill, and in an incredibly short time the beds are thinned. When the baskets are brought into the farmhouse they are emptied, and if the weather has been wet and stormy the flowers are packed roughly into pots and pans of every description, and set on shelves to dry off and assume their proper colour. If the weather has been fine this preliminary toilet is dispensed with, and the girls and women bunch and tie at once. Twelve stems go to a bunch always, and the aim is to arrange the flowers so that they shall present a compact lozenge shape, crisp and tight. Varieties are never mixed when tied, the bunches are passed on to another department, where the uneven stems are sliced off, and the flowers set in water to await packing.
Packing the flowers is a serious business. The boxes are lined with paper, little pillows are made for the flowers to rest upon, and then the bunches are deftly laid, so many this way, so many that, and a few in the centre, and behold, stems are altogether hidden, and only a mass of bloom fills the box. The end papers are turned in, a ticket placed on the top, declaring the variety of flower and the number of bunches; the cover is nailed down, and the operation is complete.
15. Industries and Manufactures.
Cornwall is too far from the coalfields to be a manufacturing county on a large scale. There are, however, some few industries and manufactures carried on in Cornwall. The wonderful wireless telegraphy installation which Mr Marconi has established at Poldhu does not, perhaps, strictly speaking, come under this head, but it would be impossible to omit mention of it and of the great services it daily renders to vessels crossing the Atlantic.
Poldhu Hotel and the Marconi Station
A considerable industry is in the making of casks, mainly for the exportation of pilchards. Woollen manufacture is carried on in a small way, also the construction of mining and other machinery. Shipbuilding occupies about 870 men. Some brick-making is done, but not to any considerable extent. The real employments supplying the vast majority of the people with bread are mining and quarrying, and agriculture and horticulture.