1818.] Manufacture of superfine Woollen Cloth. 213 



in gig mills in place of the teazles. The greatest improvement, 

 however, and which even promises to be attended with very 

 great advantage over the use of teazles, has been made by Mr. 

 Thomas Mear, of Dursley, who has invented a delicate kind of 

 elastic combs, made of brass, which can be readily substituted 

 in place of the teazles without any change being requisite to be 

 made in the machinery, and some of which have been constantly 

 in wear for six months without the least appearance of injury in 

 consequence thereof; whereas teazles, even of the best quality, 

 require to be very frequently renewed. 



Messrs. Lewis and Davis have likewise lately made a 

 machine which, though more complicated and expensive than 

 Mr. Mear's, seems likely to be attended with considerable 

 advantages over the common gig mills. Mr. Stephen Price has 

 also an improved gig mill. 



I am glad to find that this old staple manufacture of our 

 country is now in a prosperous state. The manufacturers say 

 that they have sufficient orders for their cloths ; and I noticed 

 that several new works are erecting, and new water wheels and 

 steam engines adding to those already in use. 



I am surprised that this truly interesting and highly pictu- 

 resque district, and particularly the vale of Stroudwater and the 

 neighbourhoods of Dursley and Uley, have not more attracted 

 the attention of the visitors to Cheltenham, it being very little 

 out of the direct road to that celebrated Spa. The appearance 

 of the houses and manufactories upon the steep sides of the 

 hills, which seem to the observer m the valleys below to be 

 almost as it were suspended in the air, many of them having 

 scarcely any ground to stand upon, and indeed none but what 

 has been made out of the solid rock, and no path to them but 

 by zig-zag courses cut on the face of the steep ascents to them, 

 is truly novel and surprising. The view from Uley Bury camp, 

 an ancient work, upon a lofty eminence, over the vale of the 

 Severn into South Wales, is truly grand ; and, in short, the 

 entire scenery of this beautiful and well-wooded country makes 

 it well deserve to be more generally frequented by tourists. 

 I am, Gentlemen, your most obedient servant, 



Thomas Gill. 



P. S. Having seen Mr. William Hardy since the publication 

 "',' in y ); P a P ei '» " On English and Foreign Copper, Zinc, and 

 Brass," in your last number of the Annals, he informs me that 

 he had the old Dutch brass of which he made the wheels for the 

 time-piece at the Royal Observatory at Greenwich, not of the 

 Board of Longitude, but of a Mr. Frodsham ; and paid him for 

 it at the rate of one guinea per pound! — a proof of the very high 

 estimation in which it is held by watchmakers. 



The initials of the Christian names of Mr. Hawkins should 

 have been J. J. and not T. T. as inserted by a mistake of the 

 printer in that paper. 



