is drawn upon this steel finger, permitting the seam to be sewn through and through.  The visitor to the factory can see also the minor operations of embroidering, lining—­in finished gloves—­sewing the facing, sewing the buttonholes, putting on the buttons, and trimming with various kinds of thread.  Before the gloves are ready for the boxes one more operation remains.  The gloves are somewhat unsightly as they come from the sewers’ hands, and must be made trim and neat.  To secure these desirable results the gloves are taken to the “laying-off” room.

In this are long tables with a long row of brass hands projecting at an acute angle.  These are filled with steam and are too hot to touch.  These steam tables by ingenious devices are so arranged that it is impossible to burn the glove or stiffen the leather by too much heat, a common defect in ordinary methods.  The operation of the “laying-off” room is finished with surprising quickness.  Before each table stands an operator, who slips a glove over each frame, draws it down to shape, and after a moment’s exposure to the warmth removes it, smooth, shapely, and ready for the box.  The frames upon which the gloves are drawn are long and narrow for fine gloves and short and stubby for common ones.  Then the glove is taken to the stock room, where there are endless shelves and bins to testify to the chief drawback to glove making, the necessity for innumerable patterns.—­The Mercer.

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FABRIC FOR UPHOLSTERY PURPOSES.

The object of this invention is to produce a firm, solid, dust-resisting, and durable woven cloth, composed, preferably, entirely of cotton, but it may be of a cotton warp combined with a linen or other weft, and is particularly applicable for covering the seats and cushions of railway and other carriages, for upholstering purposes, for bed ticking, and for various other uses.  To effect this object, a cotton warp and, preferably, a cotton weft also are employed, or a linen, worsted, or other weft may be used.  Both the yarns for warp and weft may be either dull or polished, according to the appearance and finish of cloth desired.  The fabric is woven in a plain loom, and the ends are drawn through say eight heald shafts, but four, sixteen, or thirty-two heald shafts might be employed.  When eight heald shafts are employed, the warp is drawn as follows:  The 1st warp end in the first heald shaft, the 2d warp end in the second heald shaft, and so on, the remaining six warp ends being drawn in, in consecutive order, through the remaining six heald shafts; the 9th warp end is drawn in through the first heald shaft, and so on, the drawing in of the other ends being repeated as above.  The order of the shedding is as follows:  1st change.  The 1st and 3d heald shafts fall, the rest remaining up. 2d change.  The 5th and 7th shafts fall, and the 1st and 3d rise. 3d change.  The 2d and 4th