Be it known to you then that the ordinary picture-framer's glass comes from Belgium in cases containing I forget how many sheets each about fifty inches long and thirty-six inches wide, and weighing roughly fifteen ounces to the square foot. The price per case varies continually, but it may be safely assumed that, given a _skilful cutter_, a retail price of twopence halfpenny a square foot will yield a profit of about twenty five per cent. Only, much of this glass has so many air bubbles in it, is so uneven in thickness, that it can only be used for pictures on the assumption that the customer will not mind a bubble giving a sinister twist to some character's eye in the picture, or in certain lights, a series of blotches upon the whole scene. It is really window glass, but when Christmas number plates must be framed in competition for about eighteenpence each, no poor framer can afford to regard trifles like that. And then its uneven substance in such large sheets makes the manipulation of it a matter of extreme difficulty except to those in constant practice and with highly trained skill. Now very early in my occupation of a shop I learned that I must give up my old fiddling system of buying my glass ready cut in Westminster and carrying it home, for many reasons, not the least of these being that I got no profit out of it. So I bought a diamond for twelve and sixpence, and happened to get a very good one. Then I ordered a case of glass, and unconsciously with it I received a stock of trouble out of all proportion to any profit I was ever likely to make. Nothing that ever I undertook gave me so many tremors, cost me so much sweat, as did this truly diabolical business of glass-cutting. The rough case in which the sheets came standing on its edge at the end of the shop was to me the abode of devils--I approached it trembling, drew out a great wavering sheet, and lifted it on to the sloping table covered with baize which I had made. If I got it there all right I heaved a great sigh of relief, and usually went about some other job for a little while to steady my nerves before tackling the more important business of cutting. That is if there was no one waiting for a square. If there was, although my mouth was dry and my heart was thumping furiously against my ribs I had perforce to assure a jaunty air and even, God help me, hum a tune while my teeth almost chattered. "Conscience doth make cowards of us all," but so does poverty and dread of loss which can be ill borne, and I will back poverty to be the greater maker of cowards. I know it will be thought that I am making a lot of this trivial matter, but I solemnly declare that during my seafaring career, in the presence very often of the most appalling dangers, I have never felt the sickness of heart that has come over me when one of the huge sheets of glass, has, despite all my care, fallen in a heap of tinkling fragments from my shaking hands.