Up: Glassmaking
Reminiscences
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case came on for trial, the court held that it would be impossible to
assess damages unless it were made cognizant of the secret, and its
pecuniary advantage to Mr. Daguet. The latter declined imparting this,
and the court refused to proceed farther."
We have shown that glass, while it has contributed
so largely to the material well-being of man, has also administered profusely
to the pleasure of woman. The belle enjoys the reflection of her beauty in
its silvered face,-- a pleasure peculiarly her own, as we all know,-- and if
we may believe poesy, the mermaid, her rival of the coral groves in the
fathomless ocean, looks with equal satisfaction upon her dubious form, as
seen in her hand-mirror. And what would Cinderella be to the nursery without
her glass slipper!
But leaving poetry to its own prolific devices,
where would science find itself without the aid of glass? The astronomer's
and chemist's vocation would be gone. Suns, planets, and stars would have
no exact existence to us, and their laws be unknown. The seaman would blunder
his way on the ocean, lucky if he guessed aright his course, and cursing his
"stars," when he did not. In short, glass is the indispensable servant
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