How Pipes are made 165 



palms of his hands, rolls it into the approximate 

 shape of a pipe. After ten hours' drying the clay 

 becomes stiffer, and is moulded. Taking the 'roll' 

 in his left hand, he thrusts a wire up it to form the 

 passage for the smoke. It is then placed in a metal 

 mould. This is composed of two valves tightened 

 together with a screw, a ' stopper,' or block, in the 

 shape of the bowl being forced into the solid head of 

 the roll. 



The moulds vary, of course, in shape, as church- 

 wardens, cutties, plain, or fancy pipes are being made. 

 They are placed in racks for another ten hours' 

 gradual drying, and passed on for trimming. This 

 work is done by women, and consists in again wiring 

 the stem, and with a curved metal burnisher trim- 

 ming off the seams and edges resulting from the 

 two-fold nature of the moulds. At this stage the 

 pipes are stamped with the maker's or wholesale 

 dealer's name. After a day or two's natural drying 

 the pipes become ' chalk- white,' and ready for baking. 

 Packed in coarse earthenware pots called ' saggers,' 

 each holding from one to three gross, they are placed 

 in the kiln. Nearly 200 saggers of pipes are 

 kilned at once, the fire being maintained for seven or 

 eight hours, and twelve or fourteen allowed for cool- 

 ing. In the early days of pipe-making only twenty- 

 four gross of pipes could be baked at once, but now 

 from 350 to 400 gross are burned at a time, with only 

 I per cent, breakage. 



The meerschaum is the queen of pipes, though it 

 is no longer regarded as the only pipe for a gentle- 

 man. Its delicate and fragile nature accord little 



