Pg. 612

¶ 1 Leave a comment on paragraph 1 0 612 HOUSEHOLD WORDS. [Conducted by

¶ 2 Leave a comment on paragraph 2 0 composition of which the stick-maker pro­bably numbers among his secrets; and lastly, they are varnished. Sometimes the surface is charred, and the charred portion scraped off here and there, so as to impart a mottled appearance to the stick. Sometimes, but more frequently on the Continent than in England, lithographic transfers decorate the surface of the stick.

¶ 3 Leave a comment on paragraph 3 1 These every-day, steady-looking, thorough­going, middle-class serviceable walking-sticks form the mainstay and support of the manu­facture, like as willow-pattern plates and twopenny cups and saucers are commercially more important to the Staffordshire potteries than Parian statuettes or dessert services. But still the more ornate and aristocratic sticks and canes give employment to a large number of work-people: whalebone, tortoise­shell, ram’s horn, rhinoceros’ horn, gutta percha, shark-spine, narwhal-horn, ivory— these are some only among many substances employed for sticks. The mode of working each kind does not differ materially from that of manufacturing other articles from the same materials; but there is a curious exception in relation to tortoiseshell: the raspings and parings of this substance are susceptible of being conglomerated by heat and pressure, and formed into elongated rods for sticks—a capital mode of picking up crumbs, and making them useful.

¶ 4 Leave a comment on paragraph 4 1 As to the ferules, crooks, handles, and decorative appendages, who shall number them? Gold, silver, sham-gold, sham-silver, ivory, ebony, tortoiseshell, mother o’ pearl, agate, cornelian, jasper, jade, leather, hair, silk, skin—all are employed. What offence crooks have given, that they should be out of favour, does not appear; but certain it is that the rectangular handle is now in the ascendant: it juts out in stern precision from the vertical stem, and ignores Hogarth’s theory of the beauty of curved lines. It sometimes aspires to stags’ heads, and at others descends to stags’ feet; and not unfrequently it makes a Jenny Lind-ish attempt at portraiture.

¶ 5 Leave a comment on paragraph 5 0 So large has this manufacture now become, that the principal London maker is said to sell annually about one hundred and fifty thousand walking-sticks made of English wood, and three hundred and sixty thousand rattans and canes for making the more ex­pensive varieties. The polished ash sticks are mostly made at Birmingham; where they are sawn and turned by machine-lathes, previous to the polishing. The importation of walking- sticks from abroad is not very considerable, as the English makers strive to meet all the demand that may arise: this relates to the finished sticks, and not to the raw material.

¶ 6 Leave a comment on paragraph 6 2 There is a nationality even in walking-sticks. Germany makes better whalebone sticks than England, and is also expert in making elastic and tough sticks from the almost impenetrable hide of the rhinoceros. Austria excels in the sticks with carved ivory handles; but England bears the palm for those ornamented with silver wire, or gold and silver chasing. Paris is said to have had, in 1847, no less than one hundred and sixty-five manufacturers, and nine hundred and sixty-two workpeople employed in making walking- sticks and whips ; but, as we cannot tell how many have been added to these numbers from other and similar trades, so are we likewise without data to settle the numerical claims of the walking-sticks. There were, however, four thousand five hundred and fifty-six cwts. of rattans, bamboos, and other canes imported into France in 1850, and this seems to tell significantly of a large walking-cane manu­facture in that country. The little Grand Ducal (if anything so little can be grand) State of Hesse excels all other countries in the manufacture of pictorial walking-sticks. In neatly transferring lithographic patterns to sticks Hesse is unrivalled. They are sold largely to England and America, and some of them are exceedingly elegant; the patterns are transferred from paper while the ink from the printing, whether coloured or black, is wet, and the stick is afterwards varnished.

¶ 7 Leave a comment on paragraph 7 2 But Hamburg seems to be the walking- stick metropolis. Herr Meyer, of that city, is the king of stick-makers. His star of walking-sticks, radiating in all its splendour in the Zollverein department of the Great Exhibition, attracted many an admiring gaze. Very little less than five hundred varieties there made their appearance; from the ornate and costly, down to the useful and cheap. Being a free port for the reception of sticks and canes from all parts of the world, and (hand-labour being cheaper there than in London, Hamburg drives a large trade in this department of industry.

¶ 8 Leave a comment on paragraph 8 1 Crochetty walking-sticks occasionally make a noise in the world—walking-sticks which contain a shop full of furniture (more or less) in their bosoms. A Scottish physician has lately constructed a walking-stick containing a variety of medical instruments and medicines. Another sagacious personage has enriched society with a walking-stick containing a com­pass, a mirror, a dressing-case, an inkstand, a telescope, a thermometer, a set of drawing instruments, stationery, and lucifers. A third, thoughtful concerning the supply of nature’s wants, has made a walking-stick which acts as a miniature larder and wine­cellar; for it contains a long cylindrical bottle, a wine-glass on similar elongated prin­ciples, and a receptacle for biscuits or com­pressed meat. Another has contrived to pack away in his walking-stick a useful map of London and a compass. A fifth (perhaps an electro-biological gentleman) has made a walking-stick with a complete galvanic battery in its interior; “on holding the knob in the hand, a shock is slightly felt, and by taking a piece of silver or copper in each hand, and touching the knob on each side, the shock is greatly increased!”