activities in America had always been somewhat less than suc- 

 cessful. His brother felt it was "imperative ... to help him find 

 something more worthy of him and his education." In 1807, a 

 tannery seemed "to be the most hopeful business," ^'^^ but by 

 November of 1809 interest had shitted to a woolen mill. Here was 

 a new business where "industry and information" were needed, 

 "and not everyone has them." Tanning, on the contrary, was "a 

 trade that everyone can follow and does; the country is full of 

 tanneries, each doing a small business." E. I. du Pont continued 

 his comparison of leather and textile manufacture: 



We could not think oi making tannin here for exportation to F.urope; bark 

 costs as much here as at Nemours; it is somewhat cheaper in the backwoods 

 but there are no laborers there. The Peace will not injure our cloth mills as 

 you fear; all manufactured goods can succeed in this country, and this kind 

 at least as well as any other. ^^^ 



Despite these objections the father, not easily discouraged, 

 continued to press for the establishment of a tannery. Du Pont 

 de Nemours was so determined that he went to some lengths to 

 partially explain Seguin's process: 



Seguin's method with leather is only the perfecting of juicy tanning, of which 

 I have sent you two good descriptions. This Juicy method was an improve- 

 ment of the original art; it worked faster and better. In writing of his 

 method, Seguin said, "By wetting the leather with the juice of the tan 

 collected from the lower part of the tan pit and saturating the tan that has 

 not given out all of its astringent property several times with this juice, the 

 tanning is done better and more quickly than by leaving it in the bottom of the 

 pit and allowing the tan to separate slowly. I can do still better and quicker 

 work by preparing in advance and in such quantities as I wish juice of tan 

 impregnated with the astringent and keeping my leather in a perpetual bath 

 of it. He really did it much quicker, but not much better — perhaps rather 

 less well. . . . But it was a distinct advantage to accomplish in two or three 

 months what had before been a matter of a year — fifteen or eighteen or 

 twenty-one months — sometimes two years. The profit on the capital in labor 

 and interest alone was enormous. And he would have gained in quality as 

 well as in time if he had allowed five or six months instead of two or three. '''^ 



Du Pont de Nemours also answered the objections regarding the 

 availability of bark and tannin: 



I thought that on the Brandywine you had many oaks of different varieties 

 and other trees even richer in tannin, or a more astringent tannin than that 

 of our European oaks. If they are found only in the backwoods, would it 



I" B. G. du Pont, op. cit., vol. 7, p. 298. 

 "8 B. G. du Pont, op. cit., vol. 8, pp. 230-231. 



''" du Pont de Nemours to E. I. du Pont, January 26, 1810, in B. G. du Pont, op. cit., vol. 8, 

 pp. 256-257. 



52 



