MACHINERY IN TEXTILES. 139 



spun, having been a day's task for a day of ten hours, 

 with those old machines. In my essay upon " Our 

 Labor Difficulties " it is estimated that it would re- 

 quire 100,000 women, with the old hand cards and 

 spinning wheels, to have produced the amount of yarn 

 here reported. 



At the time of publishing that essay I had been 

 unable to find any person who had been accustomed 

 to the use of the old machines and tools, and who 

 knew what a day's work by our mothers amounted to, 

 or any authority upon that point. But in March, 

 1878, Aunt Tabitha, the spinner at the Spinning Bees 

 of the Old South Exhibition, in Boston, gave me the 

 desired information, and I am glad to be able to place 

 the amount on record. Her formula for stating the 

 day's work for carders and spinners when she was a 

 girl was, that 40 threads, 2 yards long, made a knot, 

 7 knots made a skein, and 5 skeins of warp, or 6 skeins 

 of filling, were a day's work for a spinner ; and that it 

 took as long to card the cotton or wool as to spin it. 

 A day's work in those times was 15 to 16 hours. 

 This statement gives for an average day's work by 

 our mothers about 3,080 yards for two persons, one 

 carding and the other spinning, in 15 hours ; or, say, 

 1,000 yards in 10 hours for one person performing both 

 operations. Upon this basis I make my estimate. I 

 was also informed by Mr. Richard Garced, the pro- 

 prietor of the mill, that he was then employing only 

 one half the number of hands that were employed in 

 1872, though turning out fully as much work, having 

 since that time refurnished the mill with new ma- 

 chinery. 



