href="@public@vhost@g@gutenberg@html@files@42949@[email protected]#fig010" class="pginternal" tag="{http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml}a">10. These are iron screws about 12 or 14 in. long, with a finer pointed screw, like that of a gimlet, at the one end, and a square at the other; on the screw is a winged or fly nut. To use them the point is screwed firmly into the under side of the work, with the fly nut removed and used as a lever by one of the holes in its wings placed on the square on the end of the shaft. The shaft is then passed through a hole made through the top of the bench or table, and the fly nut replaced on the screw below the table to fix the work down to it. The screws are long, which is sometimes convenient, but if the work be thin it is usual to put a block of waste wood on the shaft before the fly nut, to avoid the tedium of having to screw the latter up a long way. Slackening the nut enables the work to be turned round to any required position, and there is nothing above the table except the work.

IV. Snibs or Dogs, Figs. 11, 12. These are pieces of wood screwed down to the table, which hold the panel or other piece of work by a projection. They are easily made by simply sawing out a piece of wood fairly corresponding in thickness to the panel.

Snibs or Dogs.

Fig. 13.

V. Take an ordinary “button,” Fig. 13, such as is common on cupboards in country cottages to fasten the door. Saw out a piece of the panel, one or more inches square. Put the screw through the button and turn it over the panel and the little waste piece of wood. Two or more of these will hold the work perfectly fast.

VI. The simplest method of all is to leave about an inch at either end of the panel and pass screws through these extra portions into the table. When the work is carved these ends may be sawn off.

Fig. 14. Scratch.

The Scratch, Fig. 14. This is a very convenient and ingenious tool. “It is used,” says J. S. Gibson (“The Wood-Carver,” Edinburgh, 1889), “for running small mouldings and hollows. Where the lines are long and straight it makes finer work than is possible by means of gouges. The cutters are made from pieces of steel barely 1-16th of an inch thick. Broken pieces of saws are generally used for cutters. They must be tightly fixed in the stock. It is worked backwards and forwards gently. When the cutters are filed to the required shape, they have to be finished with a slip stone to take out the file marks. They are sharpened straight across the edges.”

Fig. 15. Router.

The Router, Fig. 15. This is a small copy of the joiner’s plane of the same name. It consists of a block of wood with a perfectly flat sole; a hole through it at an angle carries the cutter and the wedge by which it is fixed. It is employed for flattening the groundwork after that has been partially excavated with the chisels. The sole of the router rests upon any margins left of the original surface, and being worked about over the ground, the fixed projection of the cutter rapidly reduces the latter to one true level. These routers are made from about nine inches long in the sole to about three inches, the smallest, which little tools have cutters about 1-8th of an inch wide.

Fig. 16. Fret Bow Saw.

Saws. These are of various kinds; perhaps the most useful is the Fret Bow Saw, Fig. 16. This consists of a light thin steel frame with screw jaws, at the open end in which the thin saw-blades are clamped. The handle is also formed as a screw, by which its jaw can be advanced about an inch towards its fellow. To place the saw in position for work, the end of the handle is screwed round until its jaw has advanced about an inch, the saw is then fixed in the opposite jaw by its thumb-screw, then in the handle jaw in the same way, after which the handle is turned until its jaw has travelled back again the distance it had previously advanced, thus straining the saw by the tension of the steel spring saw-frame. This saw is very useful for removing superfluous pieces from the outline, both in flat works and when carving in the round, as will be explained; its primary purpose is for cutting out pierced and buhl and fretwork, but for such work, as the apertures cut do not always cut out to the edges, a drill is required to pierce holes to thread the saw through the work before it is placed in the second jaw to strain it. Fig. 16 is required for pierced work laid down on a ground and then carved, a style of carving which will be described. The ordinary joiners “dovetail” or “tenon” saws, their blades with stiff backs, are required, and are almost indispensable for cutting off portions of the work and trimming it to shape; these saws are too well known to require description.

Fig. 17. Knuckle-bend.

In addition to the tools already described, the pupil will need for more and varied work the following:—I. The Spade Chisel, and Spade Gouge. These are very light, and are used for finishing by hand, as, for instance, in cutting around grapes or plums or in fine work. II. Knuckle-bends, Fig. 17. These are gouges scooped or bent in a curve like a knuckle. III. The Macaroni Tool, Fig. public@vhost@g@gutenberg@html@files@42949@[email protected]#fig018" class="pginternal"