Industrial Curiosities. Written and editei by Alexander Hay Japp, LL.D.
(Marshall, Japp, and Co.)—Those "glances here and there in the world of labour " take a sufficiently wide range. The first and longest article deals with leather, an article about the his- tory and uses of which there is indeed plenty to be said. What does the reader say to one manufacturer using ten sacks of flour and the yokes of 2,000 eggs weekly ? " For what ?" he will probably ask. They are used in preparing calf-kids. Change is at work here, as everywhere. Morocco, which ought to be made from the skin of the goat, is now made of sheepskin; and shagreen, which is popularly supposed to be shark-skin, is commonly made from the skin of the horse. It comes from Astrak-an. Australia, it seems, is very anxious to supply us with kangaroo skins. Crocodile loather should have a sale in Ireland, for it is said to be bullet-proof. Leather has its " shoddy," like cloth, for the old article can be dressed up into new. From leather we pass to wool, cud from wool, by a not unnatural transition' to beds, about which Dr. Japp has plenty of curious information to give us. So Dr. Japp travels through a variety of subjects, always entertaining and instructive. " In a Hop Garden," " Locks and Safes" (wherein there is an interesting notice of Mr. Hobbs and his lock-picking), and the inexhaustible subject of the Post Office, may be specially mentioned.
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