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To Anneal Small Steel Pieces

Place the articles from which you desire to draw the temper into a common iron clock key. Fill around it with brass or iron filings, and then plug up the open end with a steel iron or brass plug, made to fit closely. Take the handle of the key with your pliers and hold its pipe into the blaze of a lamp till red hot, then let it cool gradually. When sufficiently cold to handle, remove the plug, and you will find the article with its temper fully drawn, but in all other respects just as it was before. The reason for having the article thus plugged up while passing it through the heating and cooling process is, that springing always results from the action of changeable currents of atmosphere. The temper may be drawn from cylinders, staffs, pinions, or any other delicate pieces by this mode with perfect safety.