CLIMATE OF THE NORTHERN STATES. 163 



eighty beats per minute, and the quantity woven in 

 twelve hours was from twenty-five to thirty yards. We 

 then paid one cent per yard for weaving. The looms 

 now go after the rate of from 120 to 130 beats per min- 

 ute, and each loom turns off from forty to forty-five 

 yards of cloth in twelve hours. We now pay three-fifths 

 of a cent per yard for the weaving; each girl has two 

 looms, but occasionally tends three. For weaving of 

 finer numbers, a higher price is of course paid, as a less 

 quantity of cloth is woven with the looms at the same 

 speed." 



" The improvements in the spinning of cotton yarn 

 by water power, are perhaps more striking than in the 

 weaving department. A girl attends to 256 spindles, 

 which will spin 1,300,000 yards, (or about 740 miles in 

 extent,) of No. 14 yarn, in twelve hours, which is equal 

 to 1548 hanks, or 110 pounds. To do this on hand 

 machines twenty years ago, in twelve hours, would have 

 required upwards of 500 girls." 



Thus has America been enabled to compete with In- 

 dia and with China, and even with the world, in the cul- 

 ture and manufacture of cotton, and also to undersell them 

 even in their own markets. Is there one American who 

 can doubt that we shall do the same, ere long, in regard 

 to silk. 



SECTION XLIX. 



REMARKS ON THE CLIMATE OF THE NORTHERN 

 STATES. 



THE valleys of our great northern rivers or arteries, 

 possess a climate, which, at certain seasons during win- 

 ter, is not elsewhere to be found in corresponding lati- 

 tudes, and which has been by some compared to that of 

 Siberia. These vallies, however rich and fertile, are 



