48 FTistory of Gutta-Percha Wittie.

 

“Ah! but I don’t sharpen my thread; I puta
point upon it.”

“Doesn't that mean the same thing?”

“Well, it may generally ; but / don’t mean fie
same thing by it. Look here.”

“TI see!” cried Willie; “there is a long bit of
something else, not thread, upon it. What is it?
It looks like a hair, only thicker, and it is so sharp
at the point!”

“Can’t you guess ?”

“No; I can’t.”

“Then I will tell you. It is a bristle out of a
hog’s back. I don’t know what a shoemaker would
do without them. Look, here’s a little bunch of
them.”

“That ’s a very clever use to put them to,” said
Willie. “Do you go and pluck them out of the
pigs?”

“No; we buy them at the shop. We want a
good many, for they wear out. They get too soft,
and though they don’t break right off, they double
up in places, so that they won’t go through.”

“ How do you fasten them to the thread ?”

“Look here,” said Hector.

He took several strands of thread together, and
drew them through and through a piece of cobbler’s
wax, then took a bristle and put it in at the end
cunningly, in a way Willie couldn’t quite follow;
and then rolled and rolled threads and all over and