EXCUESIONS. XXXVll 



From the smiths' and boiler shop the party went into the brass-mould- 

 ing shops, and saw the molten brass taken from the furnaces in plumbago 

 crucibles and poured into the moulds made in sand, to come out as brack- 

 ets and scrollwork in graceful designs, which had only to be trimmed and 

 polished to be ready for use. After seeing the molten brass moulded into 

 various shapes, the party visited the pattern-shops, where models in wood 

 of pieces of machinery or anything required to be cast in metal are made ; 

 and after visiting the coppersmith, who was brazing tubes, they went into 

 the machine-shop. There they saw the brass castings being trimmed and 

 cleaned by machinery. There were machines that carved brass into all tlie 

 curious and perfect shapes required for engine-fitting ; machines that 

 planed cold steel rails, shaving off the hard metal in thick coils that grew 

 to wonderful lengths ; a machine that planed six great bronze carriage- 

 bearings at once ; drilling-machines, a milling-machine, a rapidly revolv- 

 ing emery wheel, polishing slide-bars and emitting showers of sparks ; 

 lathes turning rough iron bars into straight polished shafting ; lathes cut- 

 ting the tires on waggon-wheels, and a radio-drill that cut holes through 

 thick copper plating, and a machine on the drill principle that cut grooves 

 in brass or iron. The visitors also inspected safety-valves and slide-valves, 

 and the many and manifold parts that go to make an engine. Then they 

 examined the engine itself, a brand-new locomotive, nearly completed, 

 and saw men lagging the boiler with silicate cloth, a material made from 

 the refuse slag from a blast-furnace. They saw a travelling crane lift a 

 heavy boiler out of its frame and move it about this way and that to the 

 fraction of an inch. They saw spark-arresting gear for preventing that 

 shower of fire which one sees sometimes issuing from the chimneys of en- 

 gines burning lignite coal, perforated dampers, the water-service on a loco- 

 motive, and all the intricacies of the locomotive. Lastly they went into 

 the tarpaulin-room, where machines were sewing double seams through 

 thick canvas, and men were at work painting new tarpaulins with a patent 

 weather-proof composition, stencilling on them the broad arrow and other 

 signs denoting that they were the property of the Government of the colony. 

 Other men were engaged repairing some of the five thousand-odd tar- 

 paulins with which the railway service of the country is provided. The 

 tarpaulin-room was the last place to be inspected, and the party learned 

 there all its mysteries, even to the fact that tarpaulins could be made at 

 £2 10s. each. 



Wednesday, 21st January, 1891. 

 Visit to the Belfast Freezing-woeks. 



About thirty members and several ladies made an excursion to the 

 Belfast Freezing-works and the Kaiapoi Woollen-works, under the leader- 

 ship of Mr. F. Rtrouts and Mr. F. Waymouth. 



The party first drove to Belfast, where they inspected the freezing- 

 works. 



They were first shown the engine-room, where one of Haslam and 

 Co.'s engines of 150-horse power was at work, supplying the motive-power 

 of the factory. At one end of the engine-room were cylinders whose ends 

 were coated with ice, and below them was a square iron compartment 

 fitted witli doors. One of these doors was opened, and out poured a 

 frozen va^Dour amongst the visitors— snow, veritable snow on a summer's 

 day. 



The party next visited a room where four girls were at work sewing 

 bags in which sheep were to be inserted before freezing. The sewing- 

 machines were driven at an unusually rapid rate by steam-power, and the 

 girls handled the light material they were sewing with wonderful adept- 

 ness. One of these girls can make as many as five hundred bags per day, 



