and curved lines on it with a soft black lead pencil, go over these lines with your tracer, holding the latter perpendicularly and giving it a gentle tap with the hammer. To prevent your brass wabbling it is best to screw it by the corners to a board. In cutting out objects to be decorated it is necessary, generally, to leave a margin, not only for the screws, but to leave space for the mounting when necessary. At first you will find the lines you trace to be anything but lines of beauty, but as you proceed you will, with care, improve The traced line should be continuous, never showing any marks of the tracer having been taken up and put down again. The first tracing should be very gently done, so as to make a very faint outline. In embossing a pattern, the outlines have to be gone over again and again at different times. A thoroughly well-drawn pattern is essential in this work. You can either copy it on the brass with a lead-pencil or transfer it by means of tracing and transfer papers Be sure, however, before you begin work that every line is accurate. Having traced all the outlines very faintly with your hammer and tracer, you are now ready for the grounding. Tour brass must be well screwed down, being sure that you have it very smooth. Your grounding tool shouldbe an eighth or a tenth of an inch in diameter at the working end, which should be roughened like a seal. Go over the whole of the background with this tool, holding it perpendicularly and striking lightly. Work from your outline edges outward in all directions, trying to keep your work equal—that is, to not hammer too long on one side of your pattern before going to the opposite side. Neglect of this precaution will give your work an unsymmetrical look which no subsequent tinkering will remedy. Hammer lightly at first. Heavy blows will be apt to result in breaking the brass. As you hammer you will see your pattern gradually coming out in relief. When the embossing is
