        Both the blade and the spearhead seemed to have been very well constructed.  He was no expert in swords, but he did have a lifetime of experience in a machine shop, and it was obvious that a lot of work had gone into both the blade and the spearhead.  The long blade had been folded and hammered multiple times—he could clearly see the grain of the metal—and it had been fullered to cut the weight.  If that wasn’t enough, the blade had been case-hardened on the cutting edge only, and it had been done the traditional way: he could see the irregular border where something had been applied to keep the heat away from the main part of the blade.  On earth, it was usually done with clay.