ce
of wood. This sphere need not be mathematically accurate. It is for
rough work, and flaws and cracks are of little consequence. This wooden
ball has an axis, a piece of iron wire at each pole. And here we may
remark, that, at every stage of the process, the revolution of a sphere
upon its axis, under the hands of the workman, is the one great
principle which renders every operation one of comparative ease and
simplicity. The labor would be enormously multiplied if the same class
of operations had to be performed upon a cube. The solid mould, then, of
the embryo globe is placed on its axis in a wooden frame. In a very
short time a boy will form a pasteboard globe upon its surface. He first
covers it entirely with strips of strong paper, thoroughly wet, which
are in a tub of water at his side. The slight inequalities produced by
the overlapping of the strips are immaterial. The saturated paper is not
suffered to dry; but is immediately covered over with a layer of pasted
paper, also cut in long narrow slips. A third layer of similarly pasted
paper--brown paper and white being used alternately--is applied, and
then, a fourth, a fifth, and a sixth. Here the pasting process ends for
globes of moderate size. For the large ones it is carried farther. This
wet pasteboard ball has now to be dried--placed upon its axis in a rack.
If we were determined to follow the progress of this individual ball
through all its stages, we should have to wait a fortnight before it
advanced another step. But as the large factory of Messrs. Malby and Son
has many scores of globes all rolling onward to perfection, we shall be
quite satisfied to witness the next operation performed upon a
pasteboard sphere that began to exist some weeks earlier, and is now
hard to the core.

The wooden ball, with its solid paper covering, is placed on its axis. A
sharp cutting instrument, fixed on a bench, is brought into contact with
the surface of the sphere, which is made to revolve. In less time than
we write, the pasteboard ball is cut in half. There is no adhesion to
the wooden mould, for the first coating of paper was simply _wetted_.
Two bowls of thick card now lie before us, with a small hole in each,
made by the axis of the wooden ball. But a junction is very soon
effected. Within every globe there is a piece of wood--we may liken it
to a round ruler--of the exact length of the inner surface of the sphere
from pole to pole. A thick wire runs through thi