Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 89.djvu/396

 Your Meerschaum Pipe

���Pipes in Various Stages of Construction. Cut- ting the Meerschaum Is the First Step. Then a Hole Is Drilled in the Embryo Pipe-Head Into Which the Future Bowl of the Pipe — a Plug Worked Up on a Nearby Latht^MustFit. When the Pipe Is Mounted On This Part the Shaping Process Is Commenced

��M1-:ERSCIIAUM pipc-makiiigisone of the most interesting processes of the American mid-west. In normal times, the meerschaum comes from al)roa(l. Just now, tiial export has stopped, and the i)i[K'-niakers of Cincin- nati get it from others at home — where- ever it may be bought. It is sliipix-tl in white blocks, resembling ivory. Hut the substance is considerably whiter than the usual elephant-tusk is an<l very much lighter. In fact, the lightness of

��a gi\'en block of meerschaum is astonish- ing. Handled for American manufac- turers largely through New York com- mission houses, most of the best meer- schaum is brought from Turkey in luirope. It arri\x's in little chests, or kasten, within which each separate piece of the substance is found securely wrajiiXHl in cotton. Such meerschaum is |)aid for by the numl)er of pieces. Curiously enough, the dealers prefer small pieces to large, since it takes an

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