The Elk County advocate. [volume] (Ridgway, Pa.) 1868-1883, 1877-11-01
THE REALM OF TRuMpERY.
Where Toys. Mock Jewelry, and Novelties
Come From--American Ingenuity.

where Toys. Mock Jewelry, ind Novelties
Come From-American Ingenuity.
A New York Times reporter recently
visited an importing firm in that city,
where the great floors were packed full
with an infinite variety of toys, mock
jewelry, &c.-quite 81 500, 900 worth in
all. "Where do all our goods come
from ?" said one of the firm, in answer
to an inquiry from the inquisitive scribe;
"why from oil over the world. The
higher class of toys, fancy work-boxes,
writing g-desks, and inlaid goods come
from Nuremberg. Cheap toys, penny
whistles, monkeys on sticks, jumping
jacks, cheap. sets of furniture, dolls and
marbles, &C., are made in the mountain
GUS districts of Saxony. Formerly these
too came from Nuremberg, but now their
manufacture has been forced out to the
country where the cost of living is at
the lowest point. aud consequently the
price of labor is smallest. The cheapest
SORTS of china and glass ornaments and
toys also come from there, but the best,
including handsome vases. figure pieces,
glass iewelry, canoes, and things of that
sort, we get from Bohemia, mostly about
quantities of imitation sapphires, garnets,
topazes, and other bogus gems, that
would almost deceive the very elect, so
long as the elect are not lapidaries,
which are sold here for about $12 per
gross, and big business is now done
here in setting these false stones. That
work is done here better and more taste
fully than in any other country, except,
perhaps, France, and the extent to
which Yankee ingenuity has supplanted
hand labor by machinery enables us to
compete in price in much of the mock
jewelry trade with even the poorest paid
of the artisans of France. You would
be Mortified, no doubt, by the by, to
know how little people do earn over
there, especially in Saxony and Bohemia.
Many Of them, adults and skillful
workers, do not earn more than five or
ten cents per diem; but they all work,
even the little children. No one who
has eyes to see and fingers to toll, can
be spared. They do not eat meat, and
live almost entirely on coarse bread and
beer. A merchant or employer will
supply to family a model, say for such
pair of dice sleeve-buttons as you
showed me and the requisite material.
They divide up the work among them
selves, SO that every one of them has
something to do in it-whatever he or
she can do best. SO they manage to turn
out great deal, but they get very little
for it.
"But to return to our sources of sup
1.~., ,t.,sr Ill L.,
come from Furth and Nuremberg, the
pearl-or, to speak more correctly, the
neutrality-suspicious. from Vienna.
They are the most expensive of this
class of stuff, excepting the inlaid
enamel sets aud pieces of iewelry made
in France, some of which range one
third higher. The system of manufac-
ture in France is different from that al
ready described. Instead OF giving the
work out to families, the French do it in
factories-small ones outside of Paris,
big ones in Paris. From the French
come the most novel, original, and
charming of all the designs in this cheap
jewelry. They put just as much skill
and taste upon this enameled bit of
brass, an imitation of a piece of Pom
peiian iewelry, as they would if it were
real gold and diamonds. In this respect
the United States alone approaches
them. There are, indeed, certain special
ties, such rs ladies' chains, sets, and
certain other metal workings for personal
adornment, and perhaps little use, in
which we really excel France. The So
called Scotch wood works comes from
England the harmonicas from Austria
mainly, some also from Saxony accor-
deons from Saxony iewsharps from
Austria fine china dolls from France (;
wax dolls, worsted dolls, and rag dolls
from Saxony india rubber dolls from
the United States. By the way, We
make in Connecticut now almost all the
mechanical toys, those which move by
clock-work. And we make tops of in
finite variety in this country so cheap
and good as to defy foreign competi-
ton. The lot of vegetable ivory stuff
comes from England those crystal
beads from France and Italy. There
is range of stuff comprising an infnity
of things all from Japan and China.
Some of the inlaid cabinets are exquisite
pieces of work, and when You talk about
prices of labor, what do you suppose the
men get who put together the thousands
of minute bits that go tolmake up cabi-
net like that which is sold here for $15
I've never been there, but I've no doubt
one of them would feel himself on the
high road to princely fortune if he got
five cents day."