A globe may not, at first sight, appear a cheap production. It is not,
of necessity, a low-priced production, and yet it is essentially cheap;
for nearly all the principles of manufacture that are conditions of
cheapness are exhibited in the various stages of its construction. There
are only four globe-makers in England and one in Scotland. The annual
sale of globes is only about a thousand pair. The price of a pair of
globes varies from six shillings to fifty pounds. But from the smallest
2-inch, to the largest 36-inch globe, a systematic process is carried on
at every step of its formation. We select this Illustration of Cheapness
as a contrast, in relation to price and extent of demand, to the Lucifer
Match. But it is, at the same time, a parallel in principle. If a globe
were not made upon a principle involving the scientific combination of
skilled labour, it would be a mere article of luxury from its excessive
costliness. It is now a most useful instrument in education. For
educational purposes the most inexpensive globe is as valuable as that
of the highest price. All that properly belongs to the excellence of the
instrument is found in combination with the commonest stained wood
frame, as perfectly as with the most highly-finished frame of rose-wood
or mahogany.
The mould, if we may so express it, of a globe is turned out of a piece
of wood. This sphere need not be mathematically accurate. It is for
rough work, and flaws and cracks are of little consequence. This wooden
ball has an axis, a piece of iron wire at each pole. And here we may
remark, that, at every stage of the process, the revolution of a sphere
upon its axis, under the hands of the workman, is the one great
principle which renders every operation one of comparative ease and
simplicity. The labour would be enormously multiplied if the same class
of operations had to be performed upon a cube. The solid mould, then, of
the embryo globe is placed on its axis in a wooden frame. In a very
short time a boy will form a pasteboard globe upon its surface. He first
covers it entirely with strips of strong paper, thoroughly wet, which
are in a tub of water at his side. The slight inequalities produced by
the over-lapping of the strips are immaterial. The saturated paper is
not suffered to dry; but is immediately covered over with a layer of
pasted paper, also cut in long narrow slips. A third layer of similarly
pasted paper—brown paper and white being used alternately—is applied;
and then, a fourth, a fifth and a sixth. Here the pasting process ends
for globes of moderate size. For the large ones it is carried farther.
This wet pasteboard ball has now to be dried,—placed upon its axis in a
rack. If we were determined to follow the progress of this individual
ball through all its stages, we should have to wait a fortnight before
it advanced another step. But as the large factory of Messrs. Malby and
Son has many scores of globes all rolling onward to perfection, we shall
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