There are, however, one or two other operations of interest which we
may notice. The company do not confine their exertions to the making
of letters, various collateral developments having taken place which
fill an important part in this scheme of work.
Of these, small tablets, containing advertisements or notices, such as
we see in railway carriages, "Push after raising window," or "Close
this door after you," or some legend pertaining to Brown's Soap or
Robinson's Washing Powder. These are done by different processes, the
transfer process, as used in the potteries, being employed, but the
one most largely used is that of "brushing out," which is done by
plates.
Let us suppose that the tablet shows white letters on a dark ground,
the _modus operandi_ is as follows:
The tablet has been enameled, as already described, and is white. The
operator now takes a dark enamel and spreads it evenly over the entire
surface of the tablet. He, or she, now takes a stencil plate, of
tinfoil, out of which the ground is cut, leaving the letter in the
center.
This is carefully placed over the tablet and held tight with the left
hand, while with the right hand he holds a fine brush, which he uses
with a quick, sharp movement over the surface. This action readily
removes the unfired color from the hard, glassy surface underneath,
and leaves a white letter. This is fired, and is then complete.
Sometimes two and, it may be, three plates are necessary to complete
the brushing out, as ties must be left, as in the case of ordinary
stencils, and these have to be brushed out with additional plates. Two
or three colors may be introduced by this process, but each separate
color means separate firing. If the letters are dark on a light
ground, the process is exactly the same, the stencil only being
modified. In addition to the letters and tablets thus described, the
company also undertake the production of large enameled signs, and to
cope with the rapid expansion of this department of their work they
are erecting special furnaces, to enable them to deal with any demand
likely to be made upon them. The call for things permanent and
washable in the way of advertising is on the increase, and the
enameled plates made by the company is one of the most successful ways
of meeting the demand.
[Illustration: "THE SMITH A MIGHTY MAN IS HE."]
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