206 PROCEEDINGS OF THE COTTESWOLD CLUB 



peculiar want may transform a comparatively worthless 

 article to a high place in commercial estimation. In the 

 arts vicissitudes of this kind are continually taking place. 

 Other materials, again, are at present altogether unde- 

 veloped ; they are visible to the eye, but we know not to 

 what use to put them. They constitute a kind of avail- 

 able reserve upon which at any moment we may have 

 occasion to draw. 



The enormously increased production of wool of late 

 years has not and never will do away with the using up of 

 shoddy or reconverted woollen rags. Resides the large 

 quantity of shoddy and mungo produced at home, we 

 import 67,000,000 lbs. weight of woollen rags torn up to 

 be used as wool. The use of shoddy of late years has 

 assumed gigantic proportions. It has been well observed 

 that the combination of shoddy with wool, together with 

 the use of cotton warps, is the most valuable adaptation 

 of materials in the history of the woollen trade which the 

 ingenuity of man has discovered. By it multitudes are 

 enabled to obtain useful and comfortable articles of clothing 

 which were formerly beyond their means. Nor does the 

 advantage stop here. An immense mass of materials, 

 once thought all but valueless, has been rescued from the 

 manure heaps and made subservient to the wealth, in- 

 dustry, and comfort of thousands. Shoddy may create a 

 feeling of prejudice, or raise a smile of ridicule, but 

 manufacturers and consumers owe more to it than thev 

 are ready to admit. The manufacturers of pure wool 

 goods are indebted to it, for it has allowed them a full 

 supply of wool, which, otherwise, they could not have 

 procured except at ruinous prices. It often happens that 

 the value of a thing is only discovered after its loss. Stop 

 the supply of shoddy, and you mav reasonably expect to 

 double the price of wool and deprive millions of garments, 

 warm and cheap for the winter, light and useful for the 

 summer. Stop the supj)ly of shoddy, and you will close 



