Clayton and ShuttlewortJi s Works. 455 



are held ready for the erector's use. Each set of fit- 

 tings is ticketed with the name of the man who put 

 them together, so that he is at once responsible for 

 his judgment if anything goes wrong. So completely 

 is this system carried out that each engine as it leaves 

 the shop, receives a number, and is registered in a 

 book, with the position of the tubes and every par- 

 ticular. Hence if repairs are needed there is no diffi- 

 culty in identifying and sending off what is wanted to 

 any part of the world. We glance at the brass-cast- 

 ing house and its clay cores and boxes full of red 

 Mansfield sand, and carry away with us from another 

 place the recollection of some open sand-castings on 

 the floor, which look like a gridiron of fire, sacred to the 

 departed Beefsteak Club. 



Now we are out in the open once more, with three 

 graceful chimney-stalks, each 100 feet above us, and 

 winding our way among the engines in the test-shed. 

 They are tested to double the working pressure by 

 means of cold water through a force-pump ; and, as it 

 has not the same expansive power as hot, all danger 

 of explosion is avoided. The great forge house, of 

 some 180 feet long by 80 feet wide and 20 feet in 

 height, was our delight. Its white walls and chimneys, 

 under each of which a couple of the fifty-two furnaces 

 stand, give the whole a cool and pleasant look, while 

 the smiths, with their white nightcaps, are busy at 

 their anvils, and six steam hammers do their won- 

 drous and remorseless part. The most beautiful 

 process is fixing the tires on wheels. A tire is taken 

 red-hot out of the furnace, and fitted on to the wheel, 

 above a sort of tank. In an instant the whole edge 

 of the wheel is one mass of flames, and then it sinks 

 suddenly beneath the water. For a minute or more 

 the surface is covered with graceful wreaths of white 

 smoke, and the union of wood and iron is made ; and 

 some rivets complete the work. There is one little 

 smith's shop under the roof of the turning department 



