470 [Senate 



keeping a larger stock on hand, or if it be desirable to purchase a car- 

 go of cotton in a southern port, it may be landed near the factory 

 without incurring, the expense of transhipment, warehousing, or in- 

 land transportation ; that our extensive and affluent market, and the 

 cheap and rapid communication therewith, which factories operating 

 on this island must enjoy, would confer on them advantages, in ma- 

 king sales of their goods, superior to any in other parts of the coun- 

 try, and probably sufficient to counterbalance the presumed cheapness 

 of water poAver over steam power ; and finally, that the use of fresh 

 water in generating steam and cleansing boilers, is preferable to the 

 use of salt water. There are probably some well informed and clear 

 headed merchants and mechanics in your society, who possess the 

 information and ability which may be required to elucidate the ques- 

 tions on which the practicability of the project must depend. 



I have given you a short narrative of the opinions which have oc- 

 curred to me in regard to it, not so much because I deem them to be 

 indisputable, as for the purpose of exciting inquiry and remark. 



If a thorough investigation of the proposition should result in a 

 general conviction, that the business offers a profitable mode of in- 

 vesting capital on this island, and a useful mode of employing many 

 idle hands, an important benefit will be gained for the city. The 

 very low rate which the Croton Water Board, charges for the use of 

 water in steam engines and factories, will operate as an encourage- 

 ment to manufacturing pursuits of every description, in which water 

 is an essential agent. 



A large proportion of the scientific and laboring classes of London 

 and Paris, derive their subsistence from the wages of manufacturing 

 pursuits. I do not know that a list of the goods, wares and merchan- 

 dize, made in these cities, can be furnished ; but their value has some- 

 times been reported in the newspapers in figures calculated to strike 

 the attention of all with the greatest surprise at their vast amount, 

 and at their vital importance in contributing to the subsistence and 

 comfort of an immense population. Our own metropolis is as well 

 situated as either London or Paris, for the manufacture of articles, in 

 which they excel ; that is in silks, leather, gold, silver, iron, wood 

 and many smaller commodities, constituting an immense aggregate of 

 wealth, and exhibiting the most finished specimens of artistical skill 

 and ingenuity. To these necessary, useful and ornamental products 

 of mechanical science, in the production of which our city has been 

 increasing every year, except during periods of political convulsion 

 and financial prostration, may we not be able in time to add the im- 

 portant and extensive and lucrative business of manufacturing cotton 

 and woolen goods 1 The question is at least worthy of examination 

 by competent hands. I wish you all health, and the society unbound- 

 ed success. 



M. VAN SCHAICK. 



The following resolution was then offered by Col. Clark, and unani- 

 mously adopted : 



Resohedj That the thanks of this convention be given to Mr. Van 



