FOR SCOURING WOOL. 7 



and a half hours, or at the rate of 1,200 Ibs. per day of ten hours. 

 It is safe to say that the Toppan process can produce from 

 one third to one half more wool in the same time, and from the 

 same machine, than the old scour. I have seen a scour done 

 in ten minutes actual time, but the machinery, running for the 

 first time, so delayed the transfer of the stock from one vat 

 to another, that the time of the whole scour was about equal to 

 that of the process of to-day. 



The scouring of wool is not an expensive process, so far as 

 the chemicals used are concerned. The bill for labor is really 

 of more consequence than that for the scour. I have had es- 

 timates from two or three different sources. From one mill 

 I have an estimate that the cost of scouring is less than a quar- 

 ter of a cent per pound ; from another, and one of the best 

 processes, the expense of scouring 2,000 Ibs. of Texas wool 

 is given as $2.79, or .135 cent, or a little more than an eighth. 

 The expense of scouring 2,006 Ibs. of the very same wool by 

 the Toppan process was $5.07, or .2527 cent, almost ex- 

 actly one quarter of a cent per pound. 



Economy in the cost of the scouring liquor is not claimed 

 by Mr. Toppan, but, on the other hand, an increase, at the out- 

 side, to twice the expense is conceded. But when it is known 

 that the saving in oil will probably offset this loss, the disad- 

 vantage disappears. And then again, with the ability to pro- 

 duce in the same time, with the same plant, and the same force 

 of workmen, twice or three times the amount of scoured wool, 

 this disadvantage can hardly be urged. 



With a material in use to the extent that wool is, a saving 

 of any considerable amount of the material itself is an item 

 not to be passed unconsidered. 



It is a fact that wool scoured by Mr. Toppan's process 

 yields a higher percentage of white scoured wool than do the 

 scours of the day. Although the operation of wool scouring 

 has been begun at Canton, it is to night too early to furnish 

 comparative shrinkages from large quantities. 



Shrinkage in wool is a variable quantity. It is different in 

 different lots of the same wool, and indeed in different parts 

 of the same fleece. In order to determine the comparative 

 shrinkage from small lots, it would be necessary to take wool 

 from the same lot and treat it by the old and the new process 

 as nearly as possible under the same conditions. This result 

 would be definitive. 



The average shrinkage by the old process is, however, fixed 

 from the results of many scours, and it is possible to state 

 quite postively the shrinkage due to the scour. 



