This is then handed over to the servitor, who drops a small piece of hot
glass on to the end of the bulb, and heats the whole by holding it in
the furnace. This serves to make the joint of the two pieces perfect.
The servitor next proceeds to draw out the leg from the small piece of
glass at the end of the bulb, leaving a button of glass at the end of
the leg. The servitor then dips the end of the leg into the molten glass
within the pot and gathers on sufficient glass to form a foot. He
spreads this portion of the glass out to the required shape and size
with a pair of wooden clappers, with which he squeezes the hot glass to
form the foot.
The servitor has now done his part of the work, and the glass is handed
to the workman. It is then cracked off, and the foot caught by a spring
clip arrangement attached to a pontil, called a “gadget.” The workman
now re-heats or melts the top edge of the glass by holding it within the
furnace, and when it is hot he cuts off the surplus glass with a pair of
shears. A line is chalked on at the correct distance from the foot, and
guides the workman in cutting the glass to the proper height. He then
melts the top again and opens it out with his spring tool to the
required shape, after which the glass is taken to the annealing lehr by
the boy, to be annealed.
Other forms of wine-glasses are made, and various methods are adopted,
according to the district and class of workmen.
For instance, the method of making the above common mule wine-glass
varies in different districts. Instead of gathering the metal for the
foot upon the leg of the glass, the workman may drop a piece of hot
glass, which has been gathered by the servitor, on to the button at the
end of the leg, and by means of a pair of wood clappers spread the hot
glass to form the foot.
In another method of making a wine-glass, the stem or leg is drawn out
from the body of the bulb by pinching down a knob at the end of the
glass. The servitor draws the leg out of this knob and knocks off the
extreme end. Meanwhile, the footmaker has been preparing a foot,
gathering a small portion of metal on a blow-iron and blowing it out and
shaping it into a double globule. The end globule forms the foot and the
second merely acts as a support. The footmaker takes these globules, and
the servitor sticks them on to the drawn stem of the wine whilst it is
hot; the blow-iron holding the globules is knocked away, leaving them
adhering to the leg of the wine-glass. The footmaker then knocks off the
second globule at the line between the two and, re-heating the bulb at
the foot of the glass, opens and widens the edges out. The glass then
goes to the workman to be finished in the same way as the common mule
wine-glass.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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