THE MANUFA C TURING INTEREST. 335 



increased in tlie same time from 1,039 to 1,621. Last jear there were 

 two refineries, melting 750,200 cwt., possessing machinery of OoO horse- 

 power, and employing- 4.10 hands. Most of the sugar industry is 

 worked by the Colonial tSugar defining Company, which owns mills 

 on the Richmond, Clarence, and I'weed Rivers. The Hour-mills keep 

 pace with the local requirements of grain-growers, the eighty-three 

 establishments at work making a little under 120,(100 tons of Hour, the 

 output in 1893 being 1 12,000 tons. In metal working and machinery 

 the most active branches are the smelting, engineering, and railway 

 carriage works. The first-named employed 1,510 hands in 189I-, 

 though the number was as high as 2,351. two years before, the falliug- 

 off being one of the consequences of the depression in silver. Tlu-re 

 was in that year plant in the Colony to the value of somewhat under 

 300,000, with about 1,700 horse-power, and twenty-three establish- 

 ments. The railway workshops gave employment to 2,739 hands, the 

 highest figure being reached in 1890-1 at slightly over 4,000. The 

 plant in 1892 was valued at over £125,000, with a horse-power of 1,04(>. 

 The engineering works employed 1,920 men last year, the vahie of 

 machinery being quoted two years before at £180,07 1. Besides these, 

 upwards of 800 men are employed in iron works and foundries, and the 

 industries of boiler and agricultural implement making, wire works, 

 plumbing, and galvanized ironworks, blacksmith and coppersmith 

 work, tinware, &c., are actively carried on in a smaller way. In the 

 matter of machinery making and engineering, it should be said that 

 the employment figures show a gradual falling-off of late years, which 

 becomes somewhat considerable when comparison is made with the 

 returns of ten years back ; while smelting, wire working, and railway- 

 carriage building has increased larg*ely during the decade. In the 

 manufacture of building materials the saw-mill industry takes first 

 place. Last year 3,257 hands were engaged in 299 mills, having 

 plant to the value of about £292,000, and of 5,101 horse-power. In 

 that year 173,088,000 feet of thnljer of 1 inch thickness were sawn. 

 In 1892 the output was about 50,000,000 feet more, with 4,573 hands 

 at work, but only 288 mills. Next comes brickmaking ; but here the 

 slackness in the building trade in consequence of the depression made a 

 noticeable falling-off in the figures of the year as compared with others. 

 In 1880-7, for example, the number of bricks made reached just 

 under 244,000,000, the output of 330 brickworks, employing nearly 

 3,000 men. Last year the number made was only about 92,000,000, 

 and only 105 works were in operation, employing 1,243 men. Next 

 in order came the various industries of joinery, pottery, asphalt, lime- 

 works, cement, paint, monumental masonry, &c., all of which afford 

 employment, with those named, to upwards of 5,000 persons, though 

 two years ago the number so employed reached nearly 8,000. In the 

 preparation of pastoral raw material, forming the next branch of 

 industry, there were upwards of 4,000 men employed last year in wool- 

 washing, tanning, and boiling-down. In 1892 the nund^er of jiersons 

 so employed Avas a little under 2,000. That year ])roduced over 

 1,000,000 cwt. of tallow, of which we exported four-fifths, and 1,010 

 hands were engaged in the v,-ork ; while some £30,000 _ worth of 

 tanning plant is in operation. In coach and waggon building the 

 extent of the operations may be judged from the fact that tluv employ 



