There are very many people in the world who still prefer the hand-made shoe, and there is nothing to prevent the world generally from going back to that system if they choose; but St. Crispin’s gentle art has blossomed into a vaster field of blessings for mankind under the fruitful impetus of invention than if left to vegetate under the simple processes of primitive man. Horses, no less than man, have shared in the improvement in leather manufacture. The harnesses of the farmer’s and labouring man’s horses a century ago, when they were fortunate enough to own horses, were of the crudest description. Ropes, cords, coarse bands of leather were the common provisions. Now the strength and cheapness of harnesses enable the poor man to equip his horse with a working suit impossible to have been produced a hundred years ago. To the beautiful effects produced by the use of modern embossing machines on paper and wood have been added many charming patterns in _embossed_ leather. Books and leather cases, saddlery and household ornamentation of various descriptions have been either moulded into forms of beauty, or stamped or rolled by cameo and intaglio designs cut into the surface of fast-moving cylinders. The leather manufactures have become so vastly important and valuable in some countries, especially in the United States--second, almost to agricultural products--that it would be very interesting to extend the description to many processes and machines, and to facts displaying the enormous traffic in leather, now necessarily omitted for want of space. CHAPTER XXIV. MINERALS--WELLS. Dost thou hear the hammer of Thor, Wielded in his gloves of iron? As with leather, so with stone, the hand tools and hard labour have not changed in principle since the ancient days. The hammer for breaking, the lever for lifting, the saw for cutting, rubbing-stones and irons for smoothing and polishing, sand and water for the same purpose, the mallet and chisel, and other implements for ornamenting, the square, the level, and the plumb for their respective purposes, all are as old as the art of building. And as for buildings and sculpture of stone and marble made by hand tools, we have yet to excel the pyramids, the Parthenon of Athens, which “Earth proudly wears as the best gem upon her zone,” the palaces, coliseums, and aqueducts of Rome, the grand and polished tombs of India, the exquisite halls of the Alhambra, and the Gothic cathedrals. But the time came when human blood and toil became too dear to be the possession solely of the rulers and the wealthy, and to be used alone to perpetuate and commemorate riches, power and glory. Close on the expansion of men’s minds came the expansion of steam and the development of modern inventions. The first application of the steam engine in fields of human labour was the drawing of water from the coal mines of England; then in drawing the coal itself.