The Two Carbons

An instrument maker's workshop in Paris on a winter night, the gas jets turned low, on a zinc-topped workbench a small arc lamp on its stand twenty-two centimetres high, a round dark-stained wooden disc with two blackened U-shaped metal jaws and two turned brass clamps, held upright in the jaws a slender straight double rod of two bronze-coloured carbons with a thin white strip between them, two brass sleeves at its foot, at its tip a small brilliant violet-white arc throwing hard shadows, copper wires to the clamps, a wooden tray of spare carbon pairs beside it, a hand in a blue linen smock sleeve at the bench edge.