If it is to be finished by being napped, that is, to have the surface covered with little knots, as petershams and women’s cloaking, it is taken to the “napping engines,” where it is submitted to the action of a board curiously covered with sand, so firmly attached as not to wear off for a considerable time; this is wedged down upon the cloth, and then set in motion, describing small circles whilst the cloth is forcibly drawn from under it by a strong roller, and thus the whole surface is covered over with little knots; having been passed through the napping engine three or four times, it is returned to the shear loft to get one or two cuts on the back, thence again to the napping engine, where it receives a final run or two, and is passed to the wareroom to be measured and made up.
But if it is to be finished as a cloth, instead of the napping-engine it is sent to the steam-brushing mill, where it is passed against a revolving cylinder covered with brushes and teasles alternately, and working within a case, into which a stream of steam rushes constantly; thence it passes to another machine nearly similar, but having brushes only. Having undergone this process for several hours, it is dried, taken again to the shear loft and properly cut, then carefully “burled” and brushed, again to the “knife,” where it is “backed,” that is, cut or shorn on the back, and then brushed again, preparatory to being placed in the press, in which it is arranged in neat folds, with thin pasteboard called “presspaper” between the folds, and hot metal plates at intervals. The press is then screwed down, and after a proper lapse of time the cloth is taken out, the folds altered in order that every part may be properly pressed, and again screwed down. It then goes to the brush-mill for the last time, from whence the measurer at length gets it to make up.
Fine cloth sometimes undergoes another process called “singeing,” in which it is passed over hot cylinders; but as our object is merely to give a general idea of the complicated processes of the manufacture to our readers, and not to make them at once masters of the business, we do not think it necessary to go into very minute detail. The entire length of time occupied may be estimated at from one to nearly two months.
The machinery in the woollen factories of Ireland is certainly inferior to that of our English neighbours, and the decline of the trade renders improvement difficult, if not altogether hopeless. Power-looms for the weaving of woollen cloth, so generally at work at the other side of the Channel, have been only this year introduced for the first time to this country by Mr Moore, proprietor of the Milltown factory near Dublin; and that Irish mechanists are not inferior to any others, is evidenced by the fact that the power-looms erected at Milltown are vastly superior to those imported, and which were on the most improved construction. Whether the experiment will have any effect in reviving this sinking business, remains to be seen; but it is much to be feared that as a great branch of trade it has deserted our shores altogether; certain it is, that the great factory at Celbridge (within ten miles of Dublin), which was dismantled about five years since, employed so lately as the year 1829 more looms than are now (1840) at work in the whole county of Dublin, probably in the entire province of Leinster, and yet the introduction of machinery could be effected much more easily in Ireland than almost any where else, in consequence of the absence of a manufacturing population, whose interests might be so compromised as to make them adverse to such change, and water power, so much cheaper than steam, is both abundant and unemployed.
N.
ENIGMA,
BY P. M’TEAGUE, ESQ.
Who or what am I, that, dwelling amongst the most humble, can associate with the highest? I am low in the scale of rank, but at the head of my race, and the most ancient of my tribe; the offspring and representative of want, and despised by multitudes, yet of regal descent. I have the likeness of woman and man, but I am neither man nor woman. I have neither father nor mother, and I am childless. I have the appearance of a potentate, yet I am not a potentate, but the companion of the lowly, and their most frequent visitor and guest. It is my destiny to live equally in palaces and farm-houses, jails and hovels. I am a traveller, though one who is always obliged to journey blindfold, and sometimes bound in cords with vulgar companions, and strictly guarded.
No creature undergoes greater vicissitudes. I am the attendant of most that walk, sail, and ride. I am attached to the pedestrian, yet generally kept in confinement; or when at times liberated, exposed to the rudest scoffs and sports of the vulgar, who toss me up in the air, pelt me with sticks and stones, tumble me on the earth, and stamp on me; and if I am raised again, it is either to endure a repetition of insult, or administer to the cupidity of vagabonds.
Though I never push myself forward, I have a face of brass, and yet my eyes can never look you straight in the face. I am fickle and changeable as the wind, yet I am a friend in adversity, and never desert those who do not first discard me. I may be the first to leave you; but in the hour of your utmost necessity you will acknowledge with a sigh that I have been the last to desert my post.
I am frequently trusted, though I often betray. How many petitions may have been offered up to heaven for my coming, no man living can tell, and yet I appear every where.