June 1, 1864.] THE TECHNOLOGIST. 



ON GRANITE AND ITS USES. 507 



But for the glass-maker, there would be no transparent barometer or 

 thermometer, and meteorology would now be a science crippled from 

 birth, and halting on both feet. 



But for the glass-maker, we should have had no glass electrical 

 machine, and had that not been in our hands for more than a hundred 

 years, we should still be far distant from electric telegraphs, electric 

 lights, electro-metallurgy, or lightning-conductors. 



But for the glass-maker, we should have had no photography, and 

 that most faithful of all artists, the sun, would still in vain be offering 

 us the command of the pencil, which he had in vain been offering to 

 the generations which preceded us for thousands of years. 



But for the glass-maker, the botanist could never have tempted the 

 palm-trees and bananas, the passion-flowers and camelias, the grapes 

 and melons, and pine-apples of more sunny lands, to migrate to our cold 

 island, and defy its rigours under a sky of glass ; and he would have 

 had no microscope to reveal to him the hidden marvels of their beautiful 

 structure. 



But for the glass-maker, the zoologist could not, as he now can, even 

 though far inland, study better than even at the sea-side all the habits 

 of the rarest and most fragile sea-creatures, and watch through the 

 walls of their glass prison the ever-changing phenomena of their strange 

 life. 



But for the glass-maker, the anatomist would still, like the botanist, 

 be without his microscope, and the knowledge which it has given him 

 of the structures of the body ; nor could he, as he does, preserve iu 

 transparent vessels, for detailed study by himself and others, those 

 curious organs which it is his delight to unfold. 



Such are some of the obligations of science to glass ; but it is not 

 theoretical science alone that is indebted to the glass-maker. The sailor 

 on the outlook, the mariner doubtful of his latitude, the sentinel at his 

 post, the engineer planning a siege, the general guiding a battle, the 

 surveyor mapping out the globe, the engraver, the watchmaker, and 

 many other practicist on the great and small scale, are beholden to the 

 glass of their telescopes, sextants, theodolites, and magnifying lenses, for 

 the success, not to say the perfection of their arts. The health and 

 beauty of the whole community are ministered to bv the large modern 

 transparent window, the glass lamp-shade, and glass drinking-vessel, 

 and its beauty is especially cared for by the modern looking-glass. 



It is curious, indeed, to see how many useful objects appropriate to 

 themselves as sufficiently distinctive the one word "glass." The thirsty 

 man calls his drinking-vessel a glass. The sailor looks out for his land- 

 marks with a glass. The beauty gazes into a glass. Best of all, the 

 otherwise blind man, grateful to the special artist we are praising for 

 his gift (with reverence I use the words) of " eyes to the blind," calls his 

 spectacles " glasses." 



Lastly, if we do not yet see winter gardens domed with glass, where 



x x 2 



