In polishing metals, whether brass, iron, steel, or of whatever nature, it is essential that the tool marks and scratches of files, or other agents, should be entirely removed before the final gloss is given, otherwise the work will have a cheap look that detracts very much from its appearance.

If emery of the finest character (flour) is used, with oil, the result will be very beautiful, but this makes a mess about the lathe it is desirable to avoid. Polish with oil is softer in appearance than dry polishing, and is much more durable, being not so liable to rust and tarnish. Dry polishing is performed with sand paper of various grades, running from ½ to 0. This gives a very bright, dazzling finish, that is easily rusted. Brass must be treated with rotten stone and oil to be nicely polished, and after this the burnisher should be used. Lacquers are employed for the purpose of preserving the polish unimpaired, and are made as follows:

Directions for Making.—Mix the ingredients, and let the vessel containing them stand in the sun, or in a place slightly warmed, for three or four days, shaking it frequently till the gum is dissolved, after which let it settle from 24 to 48 hours, when the clear liquor may be poured off for use. Pulverized glass is sometimes used in making lacquers, to carry down the impurities.

The best burnisher is a piece of bloodstone ground to shape and set in a handle; they can be bought for about a dollar and a half at any watchmakers’ tool store. Rouge powder is also an excellent thing for polishing brass and German silver. German silver, in wire, also in sheet, can be had at the same place.

For silver plating fluid the workman will find that manufactured by Howe & Stevens, Boston, Massachusetts, to be the best of its class, as it leaves a thin coating of pure silver on the metal, which can be renewed from time to time, as it wears, by a fresh application.

Any articles that require to be gilt can be best done by electro platers, who will deposit as much gold on the surface as one desires, even to the thirty-second part of an inch. It is better, however, to buy a small battery, which can be had for four or five dollars, and do this for yourself. Very many other things can be electro-plated, and fac similes of medals produced at a small cost, which will be both instructive and ornamental.

SOLDERING.

There are many ways of soldering, but the amateur will find the spirit lamp and the soldering iron the most convenient and expeditious.

In soldering tinned surfaces, no particular care is needed, as the solder will adhere easily, but in brass, or other metals, it does not do so without the aid of a rosin flux or acid solution. These simply act to make the surfaces chemically clean, so that the solder will hold. In fact, cleanliness is absolutely indispensable to success, for the solder will crawl off of any thing that is dirty or greasy, even though it may not appear to be so. Lead and tin are used for solder, and can be bought of any tinner very cheaply. The end of the soldering iron (which is not iron, but copper, by the way) should be tinned, otherwise the solder will not hold on it, neither will it follow when the iron is drawn along a seam.

The iron is readily tinned in this way. File it to the shape you want it, and put it in the fire, heating it pretty hot, but nothing like redness. You are then to wipe it clean quickly on a rag wet with soldering fluid, which can be had in drug stores, and is made of muriatic acid and sheet zinc dissolved in the same; the zinc must be clean, and in small strips, and shaken gradually until dissolved. The solution must then be well diluted with water. It is used by wetting the rag aforesaid with it and rubbing the iron in it; if block tin in strips be now rubbed on the end of the iron, it will adhere, and the iron will be ready for use. The iron must not be heated so as to melt off the tin and expose the copper underneath; for the iron is then useless until tinned again.

The soldering fluid is always to be used when brass, or any surfaces not coated with tin, are to be united.

By the spirit lamp you can join metallic surfaces very easily and quickly as follows: take your plate, or whatever it is you wish to join together, and scour it bright with fine sand-paper or pumice stone and water, on the faces to be united. Apply the soldering fluid, hold it over the spirit lamp blaze, and as soon as it is well heated, rub it over with a stick of tin; when it is well tinned, lay it on a hot flat iron or the stove for a minute, until you have tinned the other piece, then clap both together, and they will set instantly.

The blowpipe is very convenient for soldering small pieces together that cannot be touched with the iron, but as it requires some skill to use it, the amateur is not likely to be very successful with it. The articles to be soldered in this way, should be placed on a piece of charcoal, so that the heat will be equally distributed and kept up during the process.

VARNISHING AND POLISHING.

On no account is a second coat of varnish to be applied before the first one is dry. If this is done the result will be a sticky, ridgy, dirty looking job. Before the work is varnished even, it must be thoroughly sand-papered to remove inequalities, and the last sand-papering should be with the finest grade. Then apply the varnish, taking care not to put too much on for the first coat. When that is dry and hard, sand-paper with fine paper again and varnish again. Three to four coats are enough for ordinary work. When the last coat is dry and hard, get some floated pumice stone flour, that is, pumice stone flour that has been washed, mix it with water to about the thickness of cream; apply it to a woolen rag, and rub it gently over the work; not too hard, for that would cut the varnish off down to the wood. After a while you will see that the surface of the varnish begins to have a hard, smooth body, like carriage work. When this occurs, you can wash the pumice stone all off, and take a little Tripoli or rotten stone and oil, and rub gently all over the job; you will then have a surpassingly beautiful and brilliant surface, that will show the grain and vein of the wood to perfection. If you desire the gloss that varnish gives, you must apply a thin coat of wearing varnish after this. In varnishing, you must buy “rubbing varnish” if you intend to polish and oil varnish, not spirit, which is apt to crack and rub up under the treatment.

In varnishing, you, of course, desire to have a true and even surface, without a ridge to show where the brush left it. Camel’s hair flat brushes are used for this purpose, but they will not answer in spirit varnishes, as the hairs drop out or are loosened from the action of the spirit on the shellac or glue, which holds them in. Bristle brushes are the best for general use. They must be soaked for an hour or more in cold water, to fasten the bristles before using.

PEARL.

This substance is easily sawed into shape, and is easily turned with a common steel tool. It is polished readily with pumice stone and water and “putty powder,” this last to be had of chemists or lapidaries. It is better to preserve the colored surface as nature left it, for the beautiful rays and tints presented by it are owing to a peculiar disposition of thin scales on the surface, which retain the light; if these be destroyed, the beauty of the material is lost. It is to be had of marine store keepers generally, or the amateur can get it more readily of the nearest button manufacturer.

MISCELLANEOUS TOOLS.

If you buy any tools, always buy the best that money can get. P. S. Stubs’ files, wire, rimmers, and screw plates, are standard tools, and the amateur cannot go astray in choosing them. A vise is indispensable, and it should be large enough to hold the work without springing.

CURVING MAPLE VENEERS.

If you wish to curve a veneer so that it will fit a half or a whole circle, it is easily done by dipping it in hot water, when it will instantly curl up into any shape you want. I do this with bird’s eye maple. This wood is easily stained any hue, and is rather handsomer in chocolate brown than in its natural color. It is then the nearest to French oak of any wood that we have, and that is unquestionably superb. Such markings and mottlings as it has, surpass anything ever seen; it is a deep, rich, chocolate brown color, full of snarls, curves, and knots, not over five eights of an inch in their largest diameters, and so beautiful that it seems as if some hand must have arranged them.

The French oak is susceptible of a splendid polish, but I am unable to say how it works, for I never worked any, nor do I know where to get it. Curled maple will also take a handsome dye. Get Howe & Stevens’s Dye Colors in powder—they can be had in any apothecary’s store, of any shade—put it in an earthen dish and boil it, then dip or sponge the veneer with it. The color will strike through and through, and you may sand-paper it as much as you please without removing it. It is a very beautiful job to take a plain ogee moulding and curl a bird’s eye maple veneer on the round part, and an ebony veneer on the fillet or hollow, and then varnish and polish it. It makes one of the most beautiful picture frames that ever was seen; having all the effect of mouldings made from the solid wood.

CUTTING MISCELLANEOUS MATERIALS.

By these I mean horn jet, malachite, alabaster, cannel coal, glass, and similar substances. For all of these, except malachite, steel will answer, but that steel will not touch. It is not a nice material to work, being apt to check and crack in the most unlooked-for manner. To those who have never seen it, I will say that it is a stone, or species of marble, obtained in Russia, and is green in color, marked with white and greenish gray stripes. The green is specially brilliant, and the effect is very fine. Although it is so hard that steel will not cut it, it is easily scratched in use, and is a soft stone, and can be readily cut on a common vulcanite emery wheel, and polished on a razor strop covered with rouge powder. It is frequently used for jewelry. Glass is easily filed in a lathe with a common file, but I do not know what any one should wish to work glass for, as it is exceedingly dangerous from the splinters which fly from it, is quite friable and easily broken, and is, moreover, so common that no value attaches to it. Very pretty vases can be made out of alabaster by turning them in the lathe.