180 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



live only by repeating the few rallying principles of their re- 

 spective parties, and eager audiences have never wearied of 

 hearing again and again that which they most earnestly believed. 

 The old lesson of line upon line and precept upon precept, the old 

 illustration of the perpetual water-drop upon the stone, must 

 alwa3's be borne in mind by those who become weary iu impress- 

 ing upon others their convictions. If we have been presumptuous 

 in the illustrations of the work we have taken in hand, it is be- 

 cause of our conviction that the truths which lie at the foundation 

 of a wise political economy are among the great truths which de- 

 mand perpetual enforcement. In the considerations above sug- 

 gested, we find an excuse for discussing a topic which is neither 

 original nor novel, but which involves the whole mission of this 

 journal ; viz., iJie Fart of the Wool Industry in our National 

 Economy. 



Introductory Definitions. Economy means a well-ordered ar- 

 rangement, and a national economy a well ordered arrangement 

 of the material interests of a nation. We shall assume that the 

 readers to whom we address ourselves, who are rather, in this 

 case, the general public than specialists in the wool industry, will 

 admit what is the universal instinct of intelligent nations, — that 

 a wise national economy demands that a nation should fix upon its 

 own territory all those branches of industrial activity which suit 

 its soil, climate, and commercial position, or, in other words, 

 whose acquisition is authorized by the nature of things ; that the 

 end of a nation, like that of an individual, is its own perfection ; 

 and that, as a means to that perfection, it should aim to develop 

 the resources of its soil and the activities of its people until they 

 become in all necessary things independent and self-sufficient. 

 The accomplishment of these objects is the true national economy. 

 By the wool industry, we understand every thing which relates to 

 the production and manipulation of wool. We discard the dis- 

 tinction between wool growers and wool manufacturers as un- 

 sound, both performing an equally important part in converting 

 the products of the soil into fabrics. The grower converts the 

 raw material, grass and grain, into fibre. The wool scourer gives 

 that fibre clean to the spinner ; lie furnishes the raw material, yarn, 

 to the weaver ; and the finished fabric of the latter is raw material 

 for still other manufactures, as of cloth for the tailor, or felt for 

 the paper-maker. The distinction, sometimes made between the 



