MYRTLE WAX is a concrete oil, or vegetable wax, the product of the class of plants myrioa, known by the name of eandleberry myrtle. It has too long been considered merely as an object of curi osity. The plant abounds in nearly all parts of North America, and varies in size from 4 to 18 feet, becoming taller as it extends into warmer regions. The bush or tree has somewhat the appear ance of the common myrtle, and bears a berry of the size of the pepper-grain or coriander-seed. These grains are of a common ash-color, containing a small, round, hard kernel, which is covered with a shining wax, that may be obtain ed by boiling the grains in water. The wax is prepared for commerce along the Canadian lakes, and might, by proper attention, be rendered an important arti cle of traffic. Tapers made of it, emit, when burning, the most delicious and balsamic odor, and the light is white and intense, equal to the best wax-candles. NAILS are commonly made by hand by men or women, and also by machine ry, invented by Church, the facility of which is so great, that the daily product is that of 12 workmen. A nail-smith, in Stirling, lately undertook to make 17,000 double flooring nails, 1200 to a thousand of 201bs., for two successive weeks. He fin ished his first week's task by 3 o'clock on Saturday afternoon ; resumed his labor on Monday morning, and concluded his second week's task with more ease than the first. The quantity was as much as three ordinary men can perform, and allow ing 25 strokes of the hammer (which was two lbs. weight) to each nail, there were no less than 1,033,656 strokes required. In addition to this he had to give from one to three blasts with his bellows for every nail, and had to move from the fire-plaee upwards of 42,836 times. In Great Britain the majority of nails are hand-made : in this country they are almost altogether machine-made. In the nail-cutting machine they can be made for one-third the cost of wrought nails, to which they are superior for many pur poses. The iron, after being rolled into plates and slit into rods, is flattened to the thickness of the future nail by a second rolling. The end of the plate is then presented to the nail-machine, by a workman, who turns the plate over once for every nail. The machine has a rapid reciprocating motion, and cuts off at every stroke a wedge-shaped piece of iron, constituting a nail without a head. This
is immediately caught near its largest end, and compressed between gripes • at the same time, a strong force is applied to a die at the extremity, which spreads the iron sufficiently to form the head to the nail. Some nails are made of cast iron, but these are always brittle, unless afterwards they be converted into mallea able iron by the requisite process.
Dr. Ure makes the following interest ing quotation from a report of the Sec retary of State for Massachusetts : "To northern carpenters, it is well known that in almost all instances it is unnecessary to bore a hole before driving a cut nail ; all that is requisite is, to place the cutting edge of the nail across the grain of the wood ; it is also true, that cut nails will hold better in the wood. These qualities are, in some rough build ing works, worth twenty per cent. of the value of the article, which is equal to the whole expense of manufacturing. For sheathing and drawing, cut nails are full as good as wrought nails ; only in one respect are the best wrought nails a little superior to cut nails, end that is where it is necessary they should be clinched. The manufacture of cut nails was born in our country, and has advanced, within its bosom, through all the various stages of infancy to manhood ; and no doubt we shall soon be able, by receiving prover encouragement, to render them superior to wrought nails in every particular.
" The principal business of rolling and slitting-mills, is rolling nail plates ; they also serve to make naiirods, hoops, tires, sheet iron, and sheet copper. In this State we have not less than twelve.
" These mills could roll and slit 7000 tons of iron a year ; they now, it is pre sumed, roll and slit each year about 3500 tons, 2400 tons of which, probably, are cut up into nails and brads, of such a quality that they are good substitutes for hammered nails, and, in fact, have the preference with most people, for the fol lowing reasons ; viz., on account of the sharp corner and true taper wth which eut nails are formed ,• they may be driven into harder wood without bending or breaking, or hazard of splitting the wood, by which the labor of boring is saved, the nail one way being the same breadth or thickness from head to point."