Incidentally he learned many other things of the workmen. Some of the very stiff calfskins, he discovered, were "dusted" or laid in bins of damp sawdust and softened before they were taken to the finishers. There were a multitude of processes, he found, for converting the leather into the special kinds desired. What a numberless variety of finishes there was! There was willow calf--a fine, soft, chrome-tanned leather which, the foreman told him, was put into the best quality of men's and women's shoes; box calf--a high grade, storm-proof leather, chrome tanned and dull finished; chrome calf--finished in tan color, and with a fine, smooth grain; boarded calf--tanned either in chrome or quebracho; wax calf--finished by polishing the flesh side until it took a hard, waxy surface; mat calf that was dull in finish; storm calf, oiled for winter wear; and French calf, which, like wax calf, was finished on the flesh side. "How in the world could any one think of so many different things to do to the skin of a calf?" ejaculated Peter. His head fairly ached with the information poured into it by the zealous foreman who, by the way, was an Englishman named Stuart. "In time you'll sort out all I have told you," Stuart answered encouragingly, observing Peter's despair. "It is simple enough when you once understand the different finishing processes. First the leather is rolled by machinery until it is pliable enough for the finishers to work on. Then it goes through a 'putting out' process; by that I mean that it is laid out on benches where it is stretched and flattened by being smoothed with a piece of hard rubber; next the edges are trimmed off and the odd bits sold; some of these go to hardware dealers who use them for washers or for the thousand and one purposes that leather is needed for in making tools." "More economy!" put in Peter. "Yes, I guess you have learned already that we do not waste much here," grinned Stuart. Peter nodded. "Afterward," Stuart continued, "follow the many methods for getting certain varieties of finish on the leather. Here, for instance, you will see men graining tan stock by working it by hand into tiny wrinkles; they use heavy pieces of cork with which they knead the material until the leather is checked in minute squares. It looks like an easy thing to do, but it isn't. It requires skilled workmen in order to get satisfactory results. Over here," and he beckoned to Peter, "men are making 'boarded calf' by beating and pounding it as you see, that they may get fine, soft stock. Here still others are glassing the leather and giving it a smooth surface by rubbing it with a heavy piece of glass." "And what are those fellows over by the wall doing?" inquired Peter, pointing to a group of workmen who, with right leg naked, were standing in a row and rapidly drawing tan leather first over a wooden upright set in the floor, and then over their knee.