But the match of to-day has a story more interesting than that of the old-fashioned match. As we have said, much of the timber used in the manufacture comes from the immense tracts of forest in the Hudson Bay Territory. It is floated down the water-courses to the lakes, through which it is towed in great log-rafts. These rafts are divided; some parts are pulled through the canals, and some by other means are taken to market. When well through the seasoning process, which occupies from one to two years, the pine is cut up into blocks twice as long as a match, and about eight inches wide by two inches thick. These blocks are passed through a machine which cuts them up into "splints," round or square, of just the thickness of a match, but twice its length. This machine is capable, as we are told, of making about 2,000,000 splints in a day. This number seems immense when compared with the most that could be made in the old way--by hand. The splints are then taken to the "setting" machine, and this rolls them into bundles about eighteen inches in diameter, every splint separated from its neighbors by little spaces, so that there may be no sticking together after the "dipping." In the operation of "setting," a ribbon of coarse stuff about an inch and a half wide, and an eighth of an inch thick, is rolled up, the splints being laid across the ribbon between each two courses, leaving about a quarter of an inch between adjoining splints. From the "setting" machine the bundles go to the "dipping" room. After the ends of the splints have been pounded down to make them even, the bundles are dipped--both ends---into the molten sulphur and then into the phosphorus solution, which is spread over a large iron plate. Next they are hung in a frame to dry. When dried they are placed in a machine which, as it unrolls the ribbon, cuts the sticks in two across the middle, thus making two complete matches of each splint. The match is made. The towering pine which listened to the whisper of the south wind and swayed in the cold northern blast, has been so divided that we can take it bit by bit and lightly twirl it between two fingers. But what it has lost in size it has gained in use. The little flame it carries, and which looks so harmless, flashing into brief existence, has a latent power more terrible than the whirlwind which perhaps sent the tall pine-tree crashing to the ground. But the story is not yet closed. From the machine which completed the matches they are taken to the "boxers"--mostly girls and women--who place them in little boxes. The speed with which this is done is surprising. With one hand they pick up an empty case and remove the cover, while with the other they seize just a sufficient number of matches, and by a peculiar shuffling motion arrange them evenly, then--'t is done!