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not being very costly compared Avith the prices obtained, the 

 lioldcrs of the balance sheets were soon enabled to live in fine 

 houses Avith pleasant surroundings, exciting the wonder of many 

 a hardv veoman to whom such a sudden accumulation of wealth 

 was utterly incomprehensible. This prosperity, of course, ditfuscd 

 itself through all classes of the community ; the children who 

 braided, the women who sewed, and the men who did the more 

 laborious work of finishing, all were to a certain extent blessed 

 with this golden shower, and evidences of prosperity appeared in 

 neat and tasteful cottages, with grounds ornamented by trees, 

 shrubbery and flowers. 



" The demand for goods of coarser grades having continued for 

 several years, the styles changed ; fiishion became a more control- 

 ling element in the business, and our home supply being exhausted, 

 foreign styles of woven straiv or lace^ Avere introduced, called 

 ■' Tuscan,' which have had a great run and yielded veri/ satisfac- 

 tori/ profits. This lace, at first imported, our ready Yankee in- 

 genuity was soon able to produce from imported straw, and anon 

 a thousand portable looms in a thousand dwellings were plied by 

 matron and maid. 



" This last-named Tuscan lace was superseded in turn by the 

 same straw in braids or plaits, imported from Florence, and at the 

 present time these are largely in use. At a still later period 

 laces came again into vogue, but in numerous styles, and made 

 from different materials — horse-hair being used in many kinds — 

 find these have maintained their places to the present time. As 

 the business has increased in magnitude, the variet}'- of braids and 

 laces has been cerrespondingly large, limited, indeed, only by the 

 skill and taste of the braiders. To supply the demand, importa- 

 tions are made from Germany, Switzerland, England, and France, 

 as well as Italy, and latel}'- the Oriental Empires have been laid 

 under contribution for their cpiota tov.'ard the general supply, 

 until, at the present time, probably nineteen-twentieths of all the 

 braids used in the business are of foreign production, and we see 

 not why this will not eontinue to be the case, as the lack of mate- 

 I'ial and the dearness of labor render the production of it in this 

 country, except in limited quantities, impracticable. 



" It Avill be readily understood that in this, as in other depart- 

 ments of business, competition has sharpened wits ; that old meth- 

 ods have been abandoned ; that new and improved machinery has 

 been substituted for manual labor and the ruder inventions of the 

 past; that order and system in the divisions of labor and the 

 adaptation of means to ends, have been evolved as the results of 

 the experience of years. In these regards, no persons, probably, 

 have been more successful than Messrs. Carpenter, former pro- 

 prietors of the Union Straw Works, in whom have centered the 



