RESPECTING RUBBISH. 99 



is a useful medical agent, besides being serviceable as lamp-oil and 

 also as a solvent of caoutchouc ; and even the refuse, left when the 

 leaves have yielded up their oil and wood, is not looked upon as 

 rubbish, but is compressed into blocks and used for firewood, while 

 the resinous matter it contains produces gas enough for the illumi- 

 nation of the factory. 



Truly, as one man's meat is another man's poison, so one man's 

 rubbish is another man's treasure. While the Russians export or 

 simply waste all their bones, other more thrifty people boil them, to 

 extract their grease and gelatine ; convert them into charcoal, to be 

 used in refining sugar ; pass them on to the turner, to be made into 

 knife-handles and a thousand other useful articles ; or grind them 

 up to supply phosphate of lime for the farmer's crops. The com- 

 monest and roughest kinds of old glass are now bought up by a cer- 

 tain manufacturer, who melts them up, colors the liquid, by a secret 

 process of his own invention, to any tint he desires, and finally jDours 

 it out to cool in flat cakes. These are broken by the hammer into 

 fragments of various size and shape, which are used to produce most 

 effective decorations, such as might be introduced with advantage 

 in many a now plain unattractive-looking building. The cost of this 

 variety of mosaic is less than that of any other, and no doubt it will 

 be extensively used as it becomes better known. 



Even such insignificant things as cobwebs are turned to account, 

 not merely for healing cut fingers — Bottom's sole idea as to their use — 

 but for supplying the astronomer with cross-lines for his telescopes. 

 Spiders' threads have even been woven, though one can not imagine 

 where or how, except in fairy-land, by fairy fingers, and for fairy gar- 

 ments ; and among the curiosities which travelers bring home from the 

 Tyrol are pictures painted upon cobwebs, the drawing of which is per- 

 fectly clear and distinct, with the spider's handiwork at the same time 

 plainly apparent. High prices are charged for these strange works of 

 art, and no wonder, for the cobweb paper — ^which resembles a fluffy 

 semi-transparent gauze — looks as if it must be extremely unpleasant to 

 draw upon ; and no doubt the eccentric artist fails many times before 

 he succeeds in producing a salable article. But we may descend even 

 lower than cobwebs in the scale of refuse, and still find that we have 

 not reached the dead-level at which things become utterly worthless 

 and good for nothing. Nay, much that is sweetest and associated in 

 our minds with luxury and refinement may now be produced from 

 that which is in itself most repulsive ; for, while artificial vanilla can be 

 made from the sap of the pine-tree, essence of almonds from benzine, 

 and the delicate perfumes of woodruff and melilot from coal-tar, other 

 scents as fragrant can be obtained from the unsavory refuse of the 

 stable. 



Perhaps there is nothing more interesting and instructive, as show- 

 ing how the meaning of the word " rubbish " varies, than the history 



