3 i8 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



high, at a uniform degree of 70 Fahr. throughout the summer. 

 To which they replied : 



" Yours of the 9th instant is at hand. We can furnish you 

 one of our No. 5 Linde refrigerating machines, having a capacity 

 equal to the melting of twenty-five tons of ice in twenty-four 

 hours" (this is the standard of the effectiveness of this ma- 

 chinery). 



" With this machine the temperature of a spinning-mill of the 

 size given may easily be kept at 70 Fahr. We will furnish the 

 whole plant, including the necessary cold-air pipes, ventilators, 

 etc., for the sum of fifteen thousand dollars." 



I have written to them to know what would be the cost of 

 operating this machine. 



Cotton manufacturers may yet be obliged to convert their 

 mills into sanitariums, to which they may attract, not perhaps the 

 most attractive women of the land, but those most capable of be- 

 ing attracted by attractive conditions of work, by offering them 

 the most equable and pleasant temperature, most conducive to 

 health, which they can find in any occupation open to them. 

 This will only be in the line of all the other improvements which 

 have been made in mill operation. 



All progress consists in alleviating the noxious and arduous 

 conditions of labor, in enabling the workmen to increase the prod- 

 uct with lessening effort, in shortening the hours of labor, in rais- 

 ing the rate of wages, and in reducing the cost of production. In 

 this line of progress there is room and to spare for us all. We of 

 the North may retain what we possess and we may continue to 

 gain in the finer branches of the textile arts. At the same time 

 we may welcome our Southern friends in their effort to supply 

 themselves and to share the wider markets of the world, which 

 may soon be open to us by the removal of the duties on the crude 

 or partly manufactured materials which are necessary in the con- 

 struction of our factories and in the processes of our industry. 



I am conscious that I have covered too much ground. My time 

 does not suffice for condensing what I have to say. I have given 

 my manufacturing friends an optimistic view of the future of 

 cotton-spinning in this country. Bear in mind that for any im- 

 mediate application these figures are all rubbish. There is at the 

 moment an overstock of Southern goods, and apparently an over- 

 supply of heavy goods and of colored goods in the North as well. 

 Therefore, unless they act upon old Billy Gray's principle of mov- 

 ing against the evidence, and operating always when appearances 

 are most adverse, they will conclude that, although we may re- 

 quire five million spindles in the next ten years, the man who 

 puts in a foundation next year may make a great blunder. 



I have ventured to suggest to the promoters of the Exhibition 



