DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.1310#0150
OF THE WORLD'S INDUSTRY. 119
2,000 pieces of willow wood (these also were all carved with a penknife); and there wa:
a table to be seen which was composed of 2,000,000 of separate morsels, all inlaid in
mosaic-work. The practical philosophers and economists of modern times complain of
the great waste of human labour in the construction of the Pyramids of Egypt—let them
consider the same subject in reference to this table. Many of our readers were, doubt-
less, like ourselves, much struck with the model of a ship, made with bottle-corks, and
rigged in the same fashion. The object of this " caprice" we cannot fathom. Mr.
Cossens, of Holborn, exhibited a model made in elder pith; and Mr. Clifford, of Exeter,
displayed models made "of the pith of the common green rush," which he carefully
informed us was such as is "used in making rushlights." In one of Hogarth's prints
there is a capital satire upon the expenditure of extraordinary means to produce a
simple result. You see a pile of complicated machinery, which indicates that an
operation requiring great power is about to be displayed. The skill of the artist in the
design and the arrangement of light and shade causes the eye to travel about and
examine the various parts of the machinery, in order to ascertain the work it is about
to perform, when finally you discover, at the bottom of the great machine, an ordinary
wine-bottle, the neck of which is corked, and the whole of this machinery is evidently
employed in " drawing the cork." Of a similar kind of elaboration, in order to effect
a very simple object, we fear we must class some of the new inventions in horns and
flutes, to the former of which many complicated crooks and curves, and to the latter
many scarcely practicable keys have been added, merely to enable the instrument to
produce a certain note which might be omitted with no great loss, or produced by other
means. Nothing injures tone more than a superabundance of mechanism. Vivier always
plays on the old French horn, without any of the complicated improvements, and
Nicholson used to play on a flute much simpler than many now exhibited, and we have
never heard any performer who gave so much tone to the instrument.
An American inventor, of the name of Wood, exhibited a combination of the pianoforte
and violin, with which he assumes that pieces can be played with the effect of these two
iustruments in concert. Something like this, no doubt, may be accomplished by giving
an attachment to the piano, which shall produce a resemblance to the sound of a violin;
but in the present instance the inventor has literally attached a violin, played upon by
four bows, which are put in motion by a separate set of keys on a small upper finger-
board, which cause the bows to " saw" (as we may truly say) upwards and downwards,
with an effect which we frankly confess to be indescribable. One might see the whole
operation, and a more ludicrous thing, both to see and hear, it has seldom been our
lot to experience. Moreover, there was nothing new in the contrivance. The " Philo-
sophical" Jury, Class Xa, however, discovered some peculiar merit in it, and awarded
the maker ".€50 for the expenses incurred in constructing his piano-violin j" a slice of
''solid pudding" (as Punch describes his imaginary award of .£20,000 to Sir Joseph
Paxton), far more acceptable than medal or "honourable mention."
An inventor exhibited "a model of a carriage," which supplied its own railway,
laying it down as it advanced, and taking it xxp after the wheels had passed over. This
was no doubt extremely ingenious, but, unfortunately, it supposed the existence of a
level line for the operation, so that its utility becomes rather questionable. A drinking-
glass was exhibited, with a partition for soda and acid, to be mixed separately, the junction
of the two streams effecting effervescence only at the moment of entering the mouth.
Few people could " stand this," we should think. In the windows of most of the great
cutlers of London may be seen knives with an extraordinary number of blades; and
on the ground-floor of the Grand Exposition was exhibited a large glass-case, as big as
a handsome summer-house, full of all sorts of fine cutlery and other workmanship in
2,000 pieces of willow wood (these also were all carved with a penknife); and there wa:
a table to be seen which was composed of 2,000,000 of separate morsels, all inlaid in
mosaic-work. The practical philosophers and economists of modern times complain of
the great waste of human labour in the construction of the Pyramids of Egypt—let them
consider the same subject in reference to this table. Many of our readers were, doubt-
less, like ourselves, much struck with the model of a ship, made with bottle-corks, and
rigged in the same fashion. The object of this " caprice" we cannot fathom. Mr.
Cossens, of Holborn, exhibited a model made in elder pith; and Mr. Clifford, of Exeter,
displayed models made "of the pith of the common green rush," which he carefully
informed us was such as is "used in making rushlights." In one of Hogarth's prints
there is a capital satire upon the expenditure of extraordinary means to produce a
simple result. You see a pile of complicated machinery, which indicates that an
operation requiring great power is about to be displayed. The skill of the artist in the
design and the arrangement of light and shade causes the eye to travel about and
examine the various parts of the machinery, in order to ascertain the work it is about
to perform, when finally you discover, at the bottom of the great machine, an ordinary
wine-bottle, the neck of which is corked, and the whole of this machinery is evidently
employed in " drawing the cork." Of a similar kind of elaboration, in order to effect
a very simple object, we fear we must class some of the new inventions in horns and
flutes, to the former of which many complicated crooks and curves, and to the latter
many scarcely practicable keys have been added, merely to enable the instrument to
produce a certain note which might be omitted with no great loss, or produced by other
means. Nothing injures tone more than a superabundance of mechanism. Vivier always
plays on the old French horn, without any of the complicated improvements, and
Nicholson used to play on a flute much simpler than many now exhibited, and we have
never heard any performer who gave so much tone to the instrument.
An American inventor, of the name of Wood, exhibited a combination of the pianoforte
and violin, with which he assumes that pieces can be played with the effect of these two
iustruments in concert. Something like this, no doubt, may be accomplished by giving
an attachment to the piano, which shall produce a resemblance to the sound of a violin;
but in the present instance the inventor has literally attached a violin, played upon by
four bows, which are put in motion by a separate set of keys on a small upper finger-
board, which cause the bows to " saw" (as we may truly say) upwards and downwards,
with an effect which we frankly confess to be indescribable. One might see the whole
operation, and a more ludicrous thing, both to see and hear, it has seldom been our
lot to experience. Moreover, there was nothing new in the contrivance. The " Philo-
sophical" Jury, Class Xa, however, discovered some peculiar merit in it, and awarded
the maker ".€50 for the expenses incurred in constructing his piano-violin j" a slice of
''solid pudding" (as Punch describes his imaginary award of .£20,000 to Sir Joseph
Paxton), far more acceptable than medal or "honourable mention."
An inventor exhibited "a model of a carriage," which supplied its own railway,
laying it down as it advanced, and taking it xxp after the wheels had passed over. This
was no doubt extremely ingenious, but, unfortunately, it supposed the existence of a
level line for the operation, so that its utility becomes rather questionable. A drinking-
glass was exhibited, with a partition for soda and acid, to be mixed separately, the junction
of the two streams effecting effervescence only at the moment of entering the mouth.
Few people could " stand this," we should think. In the windows of most of the great
cutlers of London may be seen knives with an extraordinary number of blades; and
on the ground-floor of the Grand Exposition was exhibited a large glass-case, as big as
a handsome summer-house, full of all sorts of fine cutlery and other workmanship in