On Christmas Day

It rained quite heavily yesterday on Christmas eve, melting the existing snow on the ground.

Why do I always feel that this long-anticipated day of the year flees without impression?

Christmas Day was magical once. I was young back then.

Perhaps a simple act of decorating a Christmas tree, thus having the ability to celebrate, constitutes Christmas. Or is it just an anticipation?

Elgin National Watch Co.

"The screws in a watch number forty-four, or more than one-quarter Of all its pieces. The Screw and Steel Department is one of the largest in the factory. Its magical little automata, run by nimble-fingered girls, convert shining steel wire into infinitesimal screws, pare down their heads, and cut slots in them for microscopic screwdrivers. They are polished to perfect smoothness, and then, like every other part of the watch, brought to "spring temper"-the temper of the sword-blade-by beating, which leaves them of a rich, deep blue..."

(From Making Watches By Machinery by Albert D. Richardson, Harper's Magazine, July 1869)

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