Part 11 (1/2)
CHAPTER XI
PIERRE TAKES ANOTHER JOURNEY
During the next feeeks many a letter passed between Pierre and his new friend Henri St Aain to Pont-de-Saint-Michel and spend the day visiting the Gaspard throwingThe boy was all eagerness to go and hisvery steadily and now had few pleasures It see round of duties, although with unco zeal Pierre kept patiently at thehter work; but she was not strong enough to do much outside the house As for Josef, faithful as he was, the oldrapidly and could do little s Therefore the cutting of trees for fuel, the drawing of water, the building of fires all fell to Pierre's lot
What wonder that with such constant use the boy's strength was daily increasing until he was becoiant? With no shten and stand out; and when he swung his axe and brought down a sturdy sapling it ith a glow of pleasure that he heard it crash to the ground Certainly there were compensations in hard work! Moreover was not every French boy as too young to serve in the ar what all his friends were Nevertheless the thought of a holiday did fill hi beside his workaday clothes, and toof seeing Henri St Aht it would be!
Madaht a reflection fro should be left undone that should enhance the joy of her son's outing she broke over her rules of strict frugality and packed a luncheon for him, to which she added a few of the little luxuries which for a long tih spirits Pierre set forth for Pont-de-Saint-Michel How faood it was to find Henri St A him in the office of the Gaspardover ti to show you about the throwinginto Pierre's still brighter ones ”And at noontio down by the river, and while we eat our luncheon we can talk together Therefore suppose we do not waste preciousnow, for we shall scarcely have time to see all I want to show you before the noon whistle blows”
Accordingly Pierre's box of lunch was stoay in Henri's locker, and speeding across the little bridge that connected the filature with the throwing reat factories
”Before we go another step there is one question Iin the doorway ”I want you to tellof raw silk into thread is called _throwing_”
”I'll try to explain it as well as I can, Pierre,” answered Henri
”Maybe you have stuck”All I know is that the operation of twisting, or throwsting, the fibres of raw silk has co The workmen are known as silk throwsters It is an old trade
At the beginning of the sixteenth century there were throwing ood that it is from them our present day machinery has been copied and perfected Usually the work is done on co orders fro mills for exactly the sort of thread they wish to use”
”Isn't it all alike?”
”No, indeed! It varies in size according to the number of threads in a strand, and the number of twists and turns to the inch Some materials that are to be woven require heavy, loosely twisted thread; others, that which is fine and tightly twisted And in addition to these differences some thread is not made from pure silk, or even from silk of the best quality; raw silk which is imperfect can just as well be used for certain purposes, or silk that is twisted with a strand of cotton or soreat many qualities and kinds of thread and each one has to be specified”
Pierre opened his eyes
”Organzine, for exaenerally spun fro Trarade and is coreater nu woven silks prefer not to own throwing e cities where land is expensive and they must econoet thread thrown for them cheaper than they can do it themselves Anyway, they either send their o silk here to be thrown according to certain specifications, or they tell us to get the raw silk ourselves and throw it into the varieties required If the firm sends its own silk it comes to the throwster in bulk with an order to throw a certain proportion of it into organzine of so many threads and twists; and the rest into tra computed by the pound”
”I understand”
”The throwsting of silk is a great test of the reeling If the reeling has been well done, and the size of the strand is unifor has been poor, and the guhly soaked out of the filament, the threads will snarl and break when they are put on the reat loss from poorly reeled cocoons, as I think I told you And you ives us two kinds of silk thread--the reeled silk, which is of the best quality and is the continuous fila no textile machinery to prepare its fibres; and the spun silk, which is made from the loose floss taken off before the cocoon is reeled, or comes from cocoons that were too imperfect to be wound off by the reelers The latter variety must be treated much as are the fibres from the cotton plant, or those of sheep's wool By that I ether before they can be woven on a loom Do you see the difference?”
Pierre nodded
”Reeled silk co the filatures on spools, as you sahen you were here before After that it is brought to these th--usually froo they had to employ one person to attend to every reel; but noith irl can watch twenty-four spools at once One of the interesting things is that all the finest reels used in France, Italy, China, and japan, come from America”
”But why don't the A it?”
”They have no cocoons My father says they tried raising silk in Arow in some parts of the country, but there is no cheap labor to be had over there as here, and therefore it costs too much to feed and care for the silkworms, and reel the raw silk It is far less expensive for American merchants to import the reeled silk for their loococoons”
Henri chuckled
”My father says,” he went on, ”that the A et all kinds of silk thread from the different parts of Europe; and it could not be woven on their looms, which are finely adjusted and require th So they perfected machinery for the preparation of silk thread, and practically insisted that if they were to buy of us in Europe the material ordered must be lad enough to comply with their demands, for the Americans are not only enormous buyers, but their machines are much better than ours”