"SILVERTOWN." THE boy's most popular notion connected with India-rubber is, that it is good to make "bladder pop ;" and in order to make this material, it has to go through a process of manufacture which comes to boys by a kind of instinct. We all remember, during "map days," how the india-rubber, too often called into requisition, grew hot and crumbled, and as the pieces broke off, how they found their way into the mouth to undergo the process of mastication, and how, when chewed to a proper consistency, it became ductile, non-elastic, and sticky,-qualities requisite to make it imprison the air, which, on pressure, forced its way through the yielding substance in the shape of bladders, that burst with a pop, the sole reward of the schoolboy for hours of very tiring jaw-work. How little we imagined, when employed in this manner, and enjoying by anticipation the simple pleasures of the final pop, that we were going through a process which Science has since indicated as the best method of manipulating india-rubber for the purposes of the domestic arts. In the powerful machinery employed by the manufacturers of caoutchouc, we see but an elaboration of the masticating powers of the boy's jaw, which, with the heat of the mouth, works up the sixpenny square of india-rubber into the substance we are all so well acquainted with. We paid a visit, the other day, to "Silvertown," the little manufacturing village at North Woolwich, belonging to the Messrs. Silver, in which the many substances into which india-rubber can be transformed are produced by the powerful and curious machinery there at work; and it was whilst watching the different processes that we came to the conclusion that the boy is father to the man, even in a manufacturing capacity, as we have already hinted. How little we are able to forecast the uses to which a new material may ultimately be applied, is perhaps as much evidenced by this substance, caoutchouc, as by any other in existence. As far back as the year 1770, Dr. Priestley, in the introduction to his book on Perspective, says, "Since this work was printed off, I have seen a substance excellently adapted to the purpose of wiping from paper the marks of a black-lead pencil. It must, therefore, be of singular use to those who practise drawing. It is sold by Mr. Maine, mathematical-instrument maker, opposite the Royal Exchange. He sells a cubical piece of about half an inch for three shillings, and he says it will last for several years." How little this philosopher imagined that a substance thus incidentally mentioned in a drawing-book was destined to become one of the most useful substances in the arts and sciences-nay, to be an absolute necessity of civilization. It is at the same time very remarkable that for upwards of sixty years india-rubber never advanced beyond the hands of the drawing-master; and that, during that long period, all its virtues were supposed to consist in its power of correcting schoolgirls' drawings. How many substances are there still before the world in a like condition of embryo ?—what is to be the splendid future of gutta-percha, aluminum, and the scores of other new substances that are beginning to "crop" up around us? It would seem as though it were destined for the rubber plant to play a great part in the world, as it is found in great abundance in all parts of the globe within tropical latitudes; and, like the palm, it is probably destined to do the missionary work of civilization far more effectually than any of our societies constituted for that purpose, as the pursuit of these two valuable products will lead organized bands of European traders deeper and deeper into the recesses of the tropical wilderness, where the solitary missionary could not hope to make any permanent lodg ment. The best kinds of caoutchouc are the Para and the bottle india-rubber. The latter is familiar enough to the reader; but perhaps it is not so well-known that what is Hence, we have it, that the daily allowance to each member of these six representative families cannot exceed 14d., 2d., 3d., 31⁄44d., and 5d.; and the question is—What manner of sustentation can be got out of 14 d., 2d., 3d., etc.? Well, Mr. Beeton shows that it can be managed; but only with the grand substratum of two and a half stone of flour per week, to be variously utilized by the family. The bills of fare of the respective families, as they advance in earnings, are excellent (to read, at any rate); but vegetable and farinaceous matter largely preponderates, as a matter of course: oatmeal, potato-stew, dumplings, colecannon (i.e. cabbages and potatoes mixed together), gourd dumplings, porridge, with a scant allowance of cold bacon, and sausage dumpling, rising successively to stewed tripe, sheep's head, beef soup, ox-head soup, fish pie, mutton broth, "Brazilian stew," pork pancakes, hodge-podge, toad-in-hole, rabbit stew, —until at length the family with 40s. per week can feast its eyes and stomachs with four pounds of beef, potatoes, horseradish sauce, and rice, for a Sunday dinner! It is to be observed that out of this fivepence per day, for instance, down to the penny farthing a day, Mr. Beeton provides breakfast and supper as well as dinner-all the items being duly set forth for each day of the week, with considerable and judicious variations. We do not hesitate to say that, if any intelligent and dutiful housewife were to conform to Mr. Beeton's directions, the daily fare for each of the above-named families would not only be very different from what is ordinarily "put up with," but, on the contrary, be very good and savoury. Any one may try the experiment and judge for himself, as to the possibility of living upon sums ranging from five farthings up to the luxurious fivepence a day. We must not omit to mention that both Mr. Buckmaster and the late Mr. Francatelli have done their utmost to teach the working man how to provide good, wholesome meals for their families at a trifling cost. It will be a long time, how ever, we fear, before our working classes will be induced to reform their cuisine, and rise above the bit of tainted bacon, pork, fish, or flesh-meat with which both their pockets and their stomachs are now so badly cheated. On the other hand, the waste of food continues to an enormous extent. Francatelli said that he could easily feed a thousand families on the daily waste in food alone which takes place in the reckless metropolis of London. Not a week, not a day passes that we do not hear of quantities of fish, meat, and vegetables, fruit and poultry, absolutely wasted, and only utilized for making manure. This waste is not wholly due to the carelessness of shopkeepers or the apathy of the public. It is caused fully as much by the greed of the salesmen themselves. There is a traditional and most baneful system known as "keeping up the price,” which is based on the erroneous notion that directly a thing becomes cheap it will be despised by the affluent classes; and so it is considered better to let the articles rot before the prices are lowered, when the tainted commodities become so much poison in the market, to the serious injury of the public health. It is a significant fact that our juveniles have given to the rations of decomposed fruit they consume the name of "a penn'orth of stomach-ache." The same is true of fish and poultry, in the determination to "keep up the prices." Thus we go on wasting wholesome food from year to year, and then we make the welkin ring with our despair at the costliness of provisions. It may be that to refrain from waste is an "un-English" habit. It is scarcely, at the same time, either English or manly to whine and whimper about the dearness of meat and vegetables, when we squander in sheer neglect that which would feed a thousand families every day. 66 termed caoutchouc is the milk-sap of trees, and that this juice is to be found in many other trees besides the rubbertree; indeed, there seems to be little doubt that we may draw upon a large portion of the tropical vegetable world for this valuable material. The india-rubber as imported takes the form of bottles, and there is a kind known as negro-head, possibly because when cut open it presents an appearance somewhat like that of a human brain with its numerous convolutions. The first process we witnessed at the Messrs. Silver's was the softening of these bottles and negro brains," if we may use the term, in a large tank filled with warm water. The rubber is macerated here for some hours, for the purpose of softening and cleansing it— the process it undergoes in the schoolboy's mouth. When it has been long enough in the water, it is taken to the masticating machine, which is a kind of calendering apparatus, heated by steam, and operating upon the lumps of rubber as the boy's grinders do. You see the big lumps drawn in between the smooth cylinders, apparently the most obstinate, indigestible, unmanageable stuff in the world; and after a while it issues from the other side in the form of so many "brown-bread towels," or those coarselooking, oatmeal-coloured rubbing cloths that are a necessary appendage to every sponging-bath. The transformation from the dirty-looking lumps of rubber to these little towels, about eight inches wide and three feet long, is the oddest thing possible. As they emerge, they are folded up and placed on shelves, just as we see them in baths and washhouses. Twenty-four hours' exposure to the air changes their oatmeal colour to a very dark brown. This is the first stage through which all the different preparations of indiarubber go-its cleansing process. The reader will possibly remember that india-rubber presents itself under different aspects, either as pure india-rubber, such as tobacco-pouches, etc., are made of, or as whitish-looking india-rubber, which we are familiar with in the form of mackintosh-cloaks. The vulcanized india-rubber has a somewhat similar aspect-a clay-like colour, as far removed as possible from the rubber as we see it in the bottle. Pure india-rubber is manufactured in a very simple manner. A number of the brownbread towels are taken to the Masticator, a machine composed of two powerful steel rollers, revolving with unequal velocities, and heated by steam. The towels disappear in |