As our pains-taking informant spoke, he pushed open a door, and we beheld a sight that made Mr. Bossle wipe his spectacles, and ourselves imagine for a moment that a scene from an Oriental story-book was magically revealed to us; so elegant and graceful were the attitudes into which a bevy of some fifty females--many of them of fine forms and handsome features--were unceasingly throwing themselves. Now, with arms extended, they pushed the plates to one verge of the low tables, stretching their bodies as far as possible; then, drawing back, they stood erect, pulling the plate after them; then, in order to reach the opposite edge of the plane, they stretched themselves out again to an almost horizontal posture. The easy beauty of their movements, the glitter of the glass, the brilliancy of the gas-lights, the bright colors of most of the dresses, formed a _coup d'oeil_ which Mr. Bossle enjoyed a great deal more than Mrs. Bossle, had she been there, might have quite approved. The fairy scene is soon, however, to disappear. Mr. Blake the ingenious manager of the works, has invented an artificial female hand, by means of which, in combination with peculiar machinery, glass smoothing can be done by steam. The last process is "polishing." This art is practiced in a spacious room glowing with red. Every corner of the busy interior is as rubicund as a Dutch dairy. The floor is red, the walls are red, the ceiling is red, the pillars are red. The machinery is very red. Red glass is attached, by red plaster of Paris, to red movable tables; red rubbers of red felt, heavily weighted with red leads, are driven rapidly over the red surface. Little red boys, redder than the reddest of Red Indians, are continually sprinkling on the reddened glass, the rouge (moistened crocus, peroxyde of iron), which converts the scene of their operations into the most gigantic of known Rubrics. When polished, the glass is taken away to be "examined." A body of vigilant scrutineers place each sheet between their own eyes and a strong light: wherever a scratch or flaw appears, they make a mark with a piece of wax. If removable, these flaws are polished out by hand. The glass is then ready for the operation which enables "the beauty to behold herself." The spreading of the quicksilver at the back is, however, a separate process, accomplished elsewhere, and performed by a perfectly distinct body of workmen. It is a very simple art.