be stained and they will buy no more gloves of that
make. The skins are now moistened and rolled and left for several
weeks to season. When they are unrolled, the whole skin is soft and
pliable. It is thick, however, and no one who is not an expert can
thin it properly. The process is called "mooning" because the knife
used is shaped like a crescent moon. It is flat, its center is cut
out, and the outer edge is sharpened. Over the inner curve is a
handle. The skin is hung on a pole, and the expert workman draws
the mooning knife down it until any bit of dried flesh remaining has
been removed, and the skin is of the same thickness, or, rather,
thinness throughout.

All this slow, careful work is needed to prepare the skin for cutting
out the glove; and now it goes to the cutter. There is no longer any
cutting out of gloves with shears and pasteboard patterns, but there
is a quick way and a slow way nevertheless. The man who cuts in the
quick way, the "block-cutter," as he is called, spreads out the skin
on a big block made by bolting together planks of wood with the grain
running up and down. He places a die in the shape of the glove upon
the leather, gives one blow with a heavy maul, and the glove is cut
out. This answers very well for the cheaper and coarser gloves, but to
cut fine gloves is quite a different matter. This needs skill, and it
is said that no man can do good "table-cutting" who has not had at
least three years' experience; and even then he may not be able to do
really first-class work. He dampens the skin, stretches it first one
way and then the other, and examines it closely for flaws or scratches
or weak places. He must put on his die in such a way as to get two
pairs of ordinary gloves or one pair of "elbow gloves" out of the skin
if possible, and yet he must avoid the poor places if there are any.
No glove manufacturer can afford to employ an unskilled or careless
cutter, for he will waste much more than his wages amount to. There
used to be one die for the right hand and another for the left, and
it was some time before it occurred to any one that the same die would
cut both gloves if only the skin was turned over.

[Illustration: CLOSING THE GLOVE

When sewing time comes, the glove goes from hand to hand down the
workroom, each stitcher doing a certain seam or seams.]

[Illustration: WHERE THE GLOVE GETS ITS SHAPE

After inspection the glove goes to a row of men who fit it on a
steam-heated