316 [Senate 



happily closed, the beginning of a series of annual conventionsj to be 

 continued as long as the interest of the silk business may seem to de- 

 mand ; and to make this report tlie first of a series of annual reports 

 on this subject, that shall form in the end a vast repository of facts 

 and instruction^ for reference and use in all future times ; reports 

 that will be extensively diffused, and carefully preserved, so that when 

 this business comes to stand before the nation, and before the world, 

 as second to no other on the western continent, our children and chil- 

 dren's children may here find all the recorded evidences of our strug- 

 gles and our triumphs. 



We wish, therefore, now to shape our measures in reference to this 

 great object. We think it will not be important to publish another 

 volume of letters, in extenso, like the present. This will be suffi- 

 cient for such purposes. It is therefore our purpose now to com- 

 mence collecting facts on the silk business, in such a form that they 

 can be embodied in Statistical Tables. This year we have been hap- 

 py to receive from one to two hundred letters, and yet not one in 

 twenty of those engaged in the business has written to us. Next 

 year returns will couie in by thousands, and we wish to have them 

 come in the form hereafter indicated. To secure this object, we sub- 

 join two blank schedules^ one for silk growers and the other for silk 

 manufacturers, which they will be able easily to understand and fill 

 up witli figures. 



In addition to filling the following blanks, we would invite each 

 correspondent to ofi'er any remark or suggestion, or state any disco- 

 very or improvement he may have made in any part of the business^ 

 or anything that will be of special interest to growers or manufactu- 

 rers, and all such statements will be preserved in the report. 



Another remark. We are very happy to see the public press at 

 the present time ready to publish on silk. We trust they will ex- 

 tract freely from this report, and a copy of it will be sent to any edi- 

 tor, in any part of the country, who shall signify his wish to receive 

 one, by sending a number of his paper to Messrs. Saxton & MileSy 

 New-York, publishers of the report. We wish these notices may be 

 published entire^ and that silk growers and manufacturers will pre- 

 serve them, especially the tables, for future use. 



We also trust that county, or other local silk conventions will be 

 held next September, throughout the whole country, and that returns 

 will be obtained and forwarded from every grower and manufacturer 

 "whether his operations are large or small. We will send a copy of 

 the n port, as we do this year, to every person whose name and labors 

 shall help to fill up our proposed statistical tables. 



In conclusion, we take the liberty to say, that the trustees and ma- 

 nagers of the Institute have no pecuniary interest whatever in the 

 silk business, or in any part of it: that in all these labors to promote 

 that business, we are only carrying out the designs of our asssocia- 

 tion ; that these designs are wholly benevolent, and patriotic, having 

 reference tc all the great interests of our gjreat country ; that our 



