Farmers' Week in Agricultural College. 211 



other, which in the long run will probably prove just as bad as the first. 

 The manufacturers claim that they must adulterate goods, or make a 

 poor quality, as they call it, in order to meet the demand for a cheap 

 product. This brings up the question as to whether these so-called 

 cheap products are really the cheapest. Granted that they are in the 

 initial cost, what about the lasting qualities. An investigation which 

 has been recently carried on goes to show that toweling, which cost only 

 two cents more on the yard would last three years longer, a length of 

 time out of all proportion to the extra cost. And this is usually the case 

 with other things besides towels. 



One may very well ask at this time whether the price of a material 

 can be relied on to express the real quality. To some extent this is so, 

 but there are so many other factors which enter in that it is not a safe 

 thing to do. The fact that a thing is in style, or fashionable, determines 

 the price more than the quality of the material. But admitting that 

 this can be used as an index to the quality, as long as we have nothing 

 better, the question still remains as to whether we are getting the best 

 quality. Are we getting our money's worth? "What right has the manu- 

 facturer to give us pure table linen, guaranteed as such, when half or a 

 third is cotton? 



And what does he mean by this guarantee any way ? Miss Crooks, 

 who has done a great deal of work along this line, has found in her 

 questioning that it means very little. She found that you could not 

 get your money back, if the thing proved cotton, instead of linen, and that 

 you had no recourse to law. 



One of the first things which we can do, then, is to make it our 

 business to see that this guarantee does mean something. Our ultimate 

 aim should, or course, be to have a law which would give us protection 

 in a case like this. But until this time comes we can get the merchant 

 not only to s^ay that the material is pure, but to back his statement up by 

 promising to replace the material if this is not true. This simply 

 •means that the merchant will in his turn force the manufaxiturer to 

 make the same promise to him, so that he will not be the loser. But 

 we must be able to tell in some way as to whether we are getting pure 

 material or not. This is a necessary step. Of course w^e can tell by 

 the length of time the article lasts. But usually if we wait that long 

 to determine the quality, we find that it is easier to go and buy more than 

 to take the trouble to replace the old. And then the fact arises that if 

 you wear a garment for any length of time the merchant can claim that 

 it was the kind of wear which the material received and not the quality 

 which caused it. to wear out. "We must be able, then, to tell about the 



