THE ECONOMIC DISTURBANCES SINCE 1873. 447 



same year 7,780,000 pounds. To-day, two or three chemical estab- 

 lishments in Germany and England, employing but few men and a 

 comparatively small capital, manufacture from coal-tar, at a greatly 

 reduced price, the same coloring principle ; and the former great 

 business of growing and preparing madder with the land, labor, and 

 capital involved is gradually becoming extinct ; the importations into 

 Great Britain for the year 1885 having declined to 2,472,000 pounds, 

 and into the United States to 1,458,313 pounds. 



The old-time art of making millstones entitled to rank among 

 the very first of labor-saving inventions at the very dawn of civiliza- 

 tion is rapidly passing into oblivion, because millstones are no 

 longer necessary or economical for grinding the cereals. The steel 

 roller produces more and better flour in the same time at less cost, and as 

 an inevitable consequence is rapidly taking the place of the millstone 

 in all countries that know how to use machinery. And, as the art of 

 skillfully grooving the surface of a hard, flinty rock for its conversion 

 into a millstone is so laborious, so difficult of accomplishment (four 

 or five vears of service being required in France from an apprentice 

 before he is allowed to touch a valuable stone), and to a certain extent 

 so dangerous from the flying particles of steel and stone, humanity, 

 apart from all economic considerations, may well rejoice at its desue- 

 tude. 



With the substitution of steamers for sailing-vessels upon the 

 broad ocean, the former extensive business of sail-making, and the 

 demand upon factories for heavy cloth as material for sails, experi- 

 enced a notable depression, which in later years has continued and in- 

 creased, because commerce along coast-lines also now no longer moves 

 exclusively by sail, but largely in barges dragged or propelled by 

 steam. For the four years next previous to 1886, the demand for 

 sails in the United States is estimated to have decreased to the extent 

 of about twenty-five per cent, although the carrying-trade of the 

 country by ocean, coast, and inland waters, has, during the same time, 

 increased very considerably. 



Cotton-seed oil an article a few years ago absolutely unknown in 

 commerce, and prepared from what was formerly regarded almost in 

 the light of a waste product, is now manufactured in the United 

 States, and has come into such extensive use as a substitute for lard, 

 olive, and other oils, for culinary and manufacturing purposes, that 

 its present annual production and sale are estimated to be equivalent to 

 about 70,000,000 pounds of lard ; and has contributed not only to 

 reduce notably the price and the place of that important hog-product 

 in the world's markets, but also to impair the production and depress 

 the price of almost all other vegetable oils the product of the indus- 

 tries of other countries, 



But in respect to no other one article has change in the conditions 

 of production and distribution been productive of such momentous 



