How Fish-hooks are Made. 37 



These last two steps are the crises in the life of the 

 hook which determine its future. For if in the hardening 

 process any are heated to excess, the steel is " burned " 

 as it is termed, and such will always remain brittle and 

 worthless ; while if any are insufficiently heated, they 

 will not harden, but continue soft and equally useless. 

 To heat this irregular and tangled mass of hooks uni- 

 formly through to its centre, from heat applied to the 

 outside, requires no little skill. And in the tempering 

 process the same difficulty is encountered, for if it is 

 arrested too soon, the hooks remain still brittle ; if it is 

 carried too far, their elasticity is gone, and they will 

 straighten under the struggles of the fish to escape. 



The tempered hooks are then rolled in a revolving 

 barrel, "tumbled " as it is termed, to remove, by the at- 

 trition of one against the other, the surface scale formed 

 during the hardening process, and they are then ready 

 to lacker. 



This is accomplished by seizing the hooks by the bend, 

 dipping the shank about half its length in the lacker, 

 withdrawing them and throwing them into a large bowl. 

 With two forks, one held in each hand, the contents of 

 the bowl is well stirred together, until at length the im- 

 mersed parts have parted with a portion of their lacker 

 to the uncovered parts, and the whole of each hook is 

 covered with a uniform coating. The workman then 

 wets his fingers with the lacker, removes the hooks one 

 by one, hangs them by the bend on iron racks, and places 

 them in an oven to dry. Such is the process of making 

 fish-hooks, in its simplest and usual form. Is it not won- 

 derful they can be sold so cheaply ? 



One step remains, or should remain, to be taken ; and 

 it is the only part of this long description that will, aside 



