70 I Assembly 



no doubl, from ihc great outlay necessary in the cost of the most ap- 

 proved machinery, and llie difficulty of competing with the low price 

 of labor and capital employed in Europe, consequently we may ex- 

 pect for some time to come, that our progress will be slow, but our 

 course onward is sure and certain. Though for a time the pro- 

 ducers of tiic raw material may turn their attention to it and twisted 

 silks, but we trust, under the fostering hand of wise government and 

 of the friends of protection, the time is not far distant when we shall 

 see a proportionate degree of life and animation in the silk, as m the 

 great staj)le article of the country, cotton!'^ 



The judges on mathematical and philosophical instruments, allu- 

 ding to a refractory telescope with a six inch object glass, made of 

 American flint glass, say, " We have examined the above named in- 

 strument, and considering that it is the first attempt in this country to 

 construct a telescope of large size, think it worthy of the highest 

 praise. 



"The achromatism of the telescope is very nearly perfect, the secon- 

 dary colors only being visible, and they but faintly, and the figure of 

 the glass is so nearly true that that the spherical aberration is very 

 small. 



'* With a power of sixty diameters, the telescope without difficulty 

 divides the North .Star, and shows clearly the flatcning at the poles of 

 Jupiter. It is also said to define the double ring of JSaturn, but your 

 commiitee themselves have not as yet been able to see that body un- 

 der such circumstances as to render the doubling of Saturn's ring 

 perceptible. \\ hen examining ^Satur^ no colors were visible." 



The judges on castings remark :. That it is gratifyingg to observe 

 the rapid stride our country is making m the manufacture of iron. In 

 1842, we stood second on the list of the world, and are fast progress- 

 ing to the first. 



In 1789 George Clinton, first Governor of the State of New-York 

 after the llcvolution, with a number of patriotic gcnilenien, estaljlishcd 

 the first iron foundry in this city ; at that time seldom more than half 

 n ton was melted. At this time proba'.ly 70 to 80 tons are daily melt- 

 ed and one foundry in Albany employs from 60 to 100 moulders and 

 melts about IC tons per day into stove castings. 



